


The Gamble (And Afterwards)

by petalSpitter



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Depictions of Ableism, Disabilities, Disabled Characters, Drama, Fire, Gen, Graphic Depictions of Illness, Housefires, Hurt/Comfort, Illnesses, Major Character Injury, Minor Violence, Shit's getting hog wild, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-14
Updated: 2018-01-20
Packaged: 2018-11-13 23:57:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 37,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11196165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/petalSpitter/pseuds/petalSpitter
Summary: Magnus, Merle, and Taako are presented with a gamble in Wonderland. They win? They leave Wonderland. They lose? They leave Wonderland. The real sacrifice is adjusting to life afterward.That new life is proving to be more and more  chaotic as their relationships change, every aspect of themselves is tested or pushed to the breaking point, and secrets long buried rise to the surface.





	1. A Wheel of Sacrifice, But Even Shitter

**Author's Note:**

> I struggled with the decision to put this in the public eye due to concerns about backlash over presentation or representation. If you have issues with my story, please shoot me a comment explaining your concerns and I'll be sure to respond in due time.

“Man, I hate this fucking game.” Taako huffs, not caring about the black smoke that spilled from his mouth.

“Gee, Takko, why would you _possibly_ think that?” Merle looks up at the wizard with his remaining eye, then back to the distant door.

This didn’t make sense. This room was empty. Every room they’d been in so far had some sort of purpose. Giant wheels of misfortune, monster factories that endlessly spat out enemies, hellish board games, or very strange dating games. They _always_ had a _purpose,_ even if it was simply storage _._  Edward and Lydia weren’t the kind of people to have empty rooms lying around.

This room seems to stretch on for miles, it’s far too dull for those flashy elves to even dream of. Is there a secret purpose to this endless hall? Is the floor lined with spikes for the three to trigger if they step on an invisible title? Or is there a giant, swinging axe ready to strike in the final few feet of the room? Or what if there’s a giant robot hidden in the walls?

“You’re feeling it too?” Magnus asks, voice stained by age. Humans. All you had to do was turn your head and they were already back in the soil.

“Yeah...” Merle replies, trying to scope out the featureless walls for some sort of tell. Just a hairline crack. A dot. A seam between panels. A discoloration. Anything.

Even Taako is on edge by now, and all three men’s footsteps slow and sync as they press closer together. Another step. Another foot closer to the end. Another five feet of wall examined by five eyes.

A step.

Another step.

A step.

Another step.

A step.

And yet another step.

By the time the three have finally gotten to the door they’re silently begging for the shoe to fall. They picked forsake, the other team picked trust. They’re in the clear, right? Or is this just a prelude to an impossible challenge? Should they say something before they reach the door? An odd observation? A witty remark?  A final goodbye? It’s too late, anyway, they're already there. The plain, black wood seems to mock them as they stand there, breaths held in suspense and minds working overtime to imagine what horror lies beyond it.

“Well? Are we going?” Magnus says first, grabbing the doorknob before the other two even respond, holding his breath as he opens the door to-

  
  
Another endless hall in a pastel rose garden.

A cool, heavily perfumed breeze brushes against Magnus’ outstretched arm as he realizes the door he was holding open a second ago and the black walls are gone.

“Greetings, players!” Lydia and Edward walk out of a suddenly conjured row of arches with wisteria, roses, ivy, peonies and more hanging off them. The two elves are scantily clad in translucent fabric with tiny flowers and beads sewn into the garb and lace overlays barely preserving their modesty.

As soon as the vogue elves clear the arches, the structures disappear. They’re traded for a luxurious tea time spread for three blinking into existence between the elves and the adventurers.

“Something’s fucky.” Merle says.

“We have a delightful treat for you three today!” Edward starts, pulling up a chair from a second table for two that also sprang out of the ether.

“While you three were walking down that _dreadful_ hallway we put the finishing touches on a delightful idea!” Lydia sits and lets her brother push her in, taking the teapot and ‘pouring’ herself a cup of black fog.

“You see, you three have been the most determined to escape since...”

“Since the very inception of Wonderland! We figured such perseverance was worth winning the game-”

“But to leave Wonderland, you must make an ultimate sacrifice to finally earn your prize and your freedom!”

“Wait, what?!” Magnus instantly springs into action. He grips Railsplitter in one hand and thrusts the other out to shield his friends, eyeing the garden for any signs of a final opponent.

“Ultimate...? Shit hombre, that means ‘death’, right?” Taako looks to Merle, then back to the twins once they start giggling.

“Oh, we’re not going to murder you! After all, you’ve made it this far!” Lydia takes a lemon bar from a seven-tier dessert tower where the Animus Bell lies at the very top in a pile of pink, green and blue macaroons.

“We find that such cheap last-minute defeats tend to go down poorly with the audience. If the players lose, it should be their own faults.” Edward says.

“What we intend for you to sacrifice is... a part of yourselves. To prove you truly want the Animus Bell so badly you’d change your lives forever to get it. We can’t have subpar winners in our hall of fame!” Lydia grabs the bell, teasingly pretending to take a bite out of it before setting it on her empty plate.

“And we want you to prove that by giving up a sense.” Edward lounges in one of the three chairs, an eye pattern decorating his chosen seat and a plate with two grapes before it.

“You shall choose if you walk through the rest of your lives blind, deaf, or mute.” She stands, displaying the Animus Bell on a literal silver platter as the realization smacks the three in the face.

“Oooh no. This is bullshit! This- this has gotta be bullshit!” Taako yells.

“You already took my damn eye! What else do we have for you to-?!” Merle starts, only to remember Cam.

“This... this is a joke, right?” Magnus’ grip on Railsplitter loosens as he takes a closer look at the other two chairs. The second chair has a mouth motif and a plate with white nuts and a slab of raw, pink liver in front of it. The last one has an ear and music motif, and two sculpted pieces of chocolate on the plate. “This... this a joke...”

“Not at all, Burnsides.” Magnus feels a slender, ice-cold hand on his right shoulder and nearly jumps out of his skin. “This is the most serious we’ve been this entire journey.” Edward gives Mangus a chilling smile and shoves him toward the table.

Magnus barely catches himself before tripping over his own feet, grabbing the table edge and yanking the tablecloth and all the decorations out of place.  He takes a step back and looks at the table, then to his friends. “Are uh.... Are we doing this?” They nod both solemnly, and Merle approaches first.

The dwarf looks at the mouth chair and tries to imagine a lifetime of silence. A lifetime of not talking to his children or laughing at jokes or even telling Magnus to ‘Get off the damn pot, some of us need to shower!’.

Would that be worse than losing his remaining eye and being plunged into darkness forever? He was already down one... But one eye could still see Mavis and Mookie grow up, see plays in town squares and weave seaweed baskets on rare trips to the beach.

Or would he rather live a life without sound? A life without Taako’s stupid accent and Magnus’ aged voice? A life where he couldn’t hear Mavis’ yearly recitals, Johann’s grand compositions or all the voices he heard every day and suddenly realizes he takes for granted?

“I...” Magnus and Taako look at him, still considering their own options. “No one likes to hear me talk anyway... I’ll pick mute.” He says somberly. The last thing he’ll ever say and it’s not something poetic like ‘I love you’ or ‘You’re great friends’.

“Wonderful!” Lydia and Edward clap from their own table, opera glasses in hand to watch the spectacle. “Sit down, sit down, sit down and we’ll lock in your decision!”

Merle looks at the chair - now suddenly sized for a dwarf - and to his friends, a black pit of dread in his belly. This was it. He had so much to say and he only had until he sat down. What could he say that was good enough for the last word he'll ever speak? “You two are pretty young. You act like it, too.  Sometimes it pisses me off but- I was- I’m glad I know you two. I wish I could do better by you.” Merle sits, and he feels nothing.

“Asshole... being all poignant and shit...” Taako says. Oh well, he didn’t even want muteness, anyway. If he revived Sizzle It Up! he had to talk to the crowds and see their reactions... that struck out blindness. Taako held the back of one of the chairs and took a deep breath, cold sweat on his face and smoke steadily wafting out of his mouth.

What would he be like walking through the rest of his life deaf, missing out on dozens of jokes- but... maybe if he learned to read lips? Or a spell? There HAS to be a spell for this shit! Out of the box spells and uses of arcana is his _thing_. There has to be a workaround! 

No hearing was better than no sight, at least. He couldn’t have some midnight kitchen accident because he bumped into a pan or... grabbed the wrong ingredient. (He hopes Magnus and Merle think his white knuckles are from the stress of being forced to make this choice.) Now that his sight is on the line, he actually thinks about how much he treasured his sight and how little he appreciates it- And he realizes he’s all about sight. He’s all about aesthetic and fashion and _being seen_. And he’s all about aiming spells at attackers and reading up on new spells... He can’t lose that. He doesn’t want to lose any more than they already have but he doesn’t know how he’ll go on if he loses his sight and his beauty in one day.

“This one. I pick this one. Sorry, Mags.” Taako sits in the chair he’s been clinging to and looks at Magnus worriedly, wondering if he’ll hear what Magnus says or if he’d lose his sense the second his ass hits the brocade.

He doesn’t have to listen, though.

The shock and betrayal on Magnus’ face communicates more than enough. He never got a choice in this. He spent so long wondering if Carey would tell him to throw away his eyes or his tongue he ended up with the scraps. “Shit... Uh- Do you wanna... trade?” The final chair is suddenly very Magnus sized and seems to beckon the human.

Maybe it was for the better. After all, without his sight, he’ll calm down. He’ll put down roots and maybe live to 80... But he’ll never see a dog across the street to pet or see Angus grow up. He’ll never see the ruins of Raven’s Roost again. He’ll never see Taako’s bed head or Merle’s soulwood arm sporting cherry blossoms or Hurley and Sloane or-

A lot of things, honestly.

With the same deliberate slowness of a man on death row, Magnus sits, finally joining his friends on the metaphorical chopping block.

As soon as they’re all seated the chairs push themselves in, pinning the men in place. They grunt in pain as the wood smacks their chests but don’t resist, all five eyes looking around for the axe to finally fall. And then the plates slowly start spinning around the table... zipping from Merle’s spot, to Taako’s, to Magnus’, and back to Merle’s to start their mad dance all over again

“What the-!?" Merle leans back as the plates spin faster.

“One last thing...” The twins appear in the center of the table, sitting on the desert stand and presenting Magnus the Animus Bell.

“Bad luck.”

The entire world spins around, becoming nothing but blurs of pastels and green until the table and the chairs and the roses disappeared...

 

* * *

 

 

After several hellish hours in Wonderland, the Tres Horny Boys are back in the Felicity Wilds.

Taako blinks rapidly, his vision refusing to clear as he gropes around for his umbrella. Something’s wrong. He can hear the grass rustling and the wind blowing and he can feel a whine bubbling in this throat-

“Oh god...” Hearing Merle’s voice where there should be none confirms it in his mind, and as the realization smacks him in the face-

Taako lets out a horrified scream as hot betrayal stabs through him and tears swell and fall from his cloudy, sightless eyes.

 

* * *

 

Merle doesn’t panic when he speaks. For a blissful fraction of a second he’s so confused he doesn’t remember he _shouldn’t_ be able to speak. When Merle turns his head and sees Taako madly groping around for his umbrella a few inches to his right it’s kind of funny. Look at him, he’s so dumb he can’t grab an umbrella that’s _right there_.

When Merle turns his head and sees Magnus, frozen in shock, fingers pressed gently to his throat and a single tear streaming down his cheek....

He knows he will never forget that image. He doesn’t know if it’s a blessing or a curse that he can’t hear their sobs. Merle’s never seen either of them cry like this before.

Magnus cries like a child to Merle. Short bursts of tears that are easily wiped away and cured by a drink or a joke. And it’s always over something easy. A starving dog or child in the marketplace he couldn’t help. The tale of a forest burning down or a million other sad stories that ultimately never hurt them. Hell, Magnus cries when Johann plays a good song.

Right now, Magnus isn’t crying in the ugly, immature he usually did.

Right now, Magnus is staring a million miles away, tears sliding down his cheeks agonizingly slow.

Merle’s seen this before when someone lost a loved one back in his village. They would always sink into a chair, face blank as they were dazed by the wave of grief that just smacked into them and changed their entire lives in just a few words. Then someone would rip them out of the tidal wave and they’d collapse. They’d scream and wail and sob and beg Pan for answers and pound their fists and just ask why. _Why is my wife dead? My husband? My child? My only good parent? My best friend?_

Merle’s too afraid of watching Magnus crash to keep staring and turns his gaze to Taako.

Taako didn’t cry, necessary. He just threw a fit like a damn toddler or a teenager and got over it as soon as he got his way or something shinier caught his attention. (Or he hid his feelings to avoid revealing something personal to anyone.)

Right now, Taako is curled up as tight as he can, face pressed to the dirt and hands fisted in his hair as he trembles like a leaf. Merle can’t imagine what he must sound like now. Is he screaming? Is he sobbing? Is he letting out a reedy, wire-thin whine?

And that’s when Merle finally panics.

“Oh god...” He feels like he’s going to vomit. This isn’t what he chose. Those two _lied_ to him and stole his choice at the last second. He was prepared for a life without a voice so the other two could keep theirs. Now he can feel his voice vibrating in his throat but he can’t hear it and he can’t hear Taako and Magnus won’t ever speak again and the realization is so much-

It’s too much. Merle vomits hot bile onto the grass.


	2. Trip

It’s dusk by the time one of them calls a bubble. Their Stones of Farspeech began to ring off their necks hours ago and were numbly turned off as the three tried to process what had happened.

Magnus feels wronged.

Magnus feels _robbed._

Lydia and Edward ripped his voice right out of his throat. That wasn’t what he agreed on. He agreed to spend his life sightless and to put down roots. He thought he’d still be able to speak.

All he can think about now is how he’ll never speak again. He can’t tell Taako it’s going to be alright. He can’t ask Merle how he feels. He won’t be able to explain what happened when they return to the Bureau. He’ll never chat with Angus as he grows up or tell Carey what new roguish action he did on a reclaiming mission or....

 _He can’t be the best man at Carey and Killian’s wedding now._ Who the hell wants a best man who can’t even give a speech?

That hurts the most. More than the sense of helplessness he felt as he watches his friends reel right in front of him without being able to say a word to comfort them.

The bubble crash lands not far from the trio, the shock wave rumbling deep in their bones. They all rise one by one, Merle looking to Magnus, and Magnus looking to Taako, who’s stabbed his umbrella into the grass and clings to it like a lifeboat.

“I heard stinkbeard here vomit earlier and I’m not risking stepping in that shit.”

Even without hearing Taako, the elf’s expression and the way he jabs his umbrella towards Merle tells him more than enough. He rolls his eyes and opens his mouth to speak, only for a stab of uncertainty to run through him and force him to close his mouth. What did Taako say? What does he say back? How does he sound now? Will he eventually stop talking correctly now that he can’t hear himself?

They just need to get on the damn bubble. What does he say to convey that? He and Magnus are fine but Taako could stumble past it and into fucking Phandalin at this rate. He needs a guide. Merle’s too short to link arms with him but-

“Magnus,” He points at Magnus, then at Taako. “Do that uh- lock arms with Taako like you're getting married.” Magnus tries to open his mouth to reply, replacing it with a short nod at the last-minute and walking over to Taako.

“Can’t believe this-” Taako holds his arm out for Magnus to take and wordlessly follows his lead once they begin walking.

 

* * *

 

After roughly ten minutes of arguing and wrestling the sideways bubble open and piling in, ‘wordless’ is the best way to describe their trip back. What was there to say? What could be said? There wasn’t a ‘birds and the bees’ talk for something like this. Even if they tried to talk, Magnus wouldn’t be able to say a thing and Merle wouldn’t hear a word. Without anything to discuss and exhausted from the day’s events, the trio falls asleep one by one as the bubble slowly crawls towards the moon.

 

* * *

 

Magnus is the first one to wake when the bubble jerks to a stop in the hanger. For a single, blissful moment he forgets all about Wonderland and the Animus Bell and sits up, opening his mouth to tell the other two-

And then he remembers. There’s a horrible moment when he feels the same stab in his chest as the first time he realized his voice was gone. but it’s a tad duller than the first time. (Magnus hopes it’s so dull one day it’s more like a stone in his ribs than a knife in his heart.)

He’s shaken Merle awake by the time the doors open, a hundred wide-eyed faces peering into the bubble. The Director runs up to the door first, hiking up fistfuls of her robes and running faster than either of them have ever seen.

“Magnus! Merle! Oh, thank goodness you’re all still alive!” She looks over and sees Taako's still body in the chair, heart leaping into her chest for a moment. “Oh no... I’m- My condolences to you two-”

She’s interrupted when the elf groans and sits up, rubbing his eyes and opening them. And blinking a few times. And rubbing them again. And then he finally remembers. ”Oh, shit...” The grim tone alone tells Lucretia something’s wrong.

“One of you fuckers get over here! And there’s my umbrella?!” Magnus goes over and hands Taako his umbrella, helping him to his feet and taking his arm in one fluid motion. Lucretia watches like a hawk the entire exchange, trying to figure out exactly what those elves took in her old teammates’ quest for the bell.

“Merle?” She turns to him. His eyes are glued to her lips and worry is plastered all over his face.

“Merle?” She repeats, leaning closer. Why is he looking at her like that? Why isn’t he replying?

“Magnus, what happened back there?” Lucretia turns to the human, taking in the way Magnus held Taako’s arm, the way Taako held out his umbrella and his cloudy eyes hidden under his hat’s massive brim.

“Well,” Taako starts as Magnus taps his own throat. “I’m blind.” He points at himself with the umbrella. “He’s mute.” He elbows Magnus. “And he’s deaf, thanks to a shit deal from a couple of blue balling liches.” Taako jabs the umbrella in Merle’s direction.

Lucretia feels like she’s been smacked. She surreptitiously grips her staff tight and presses it into the floor of the bubble to keep herself upright. This was her fault. Their pain, their struggles, their newfound agonies... She knew this would happen but that didn’t make the weight on her shoulders any lighter.

“I’m sorry.” She’s apologizing for far more than the three will ever know. “I’m so sorry.” It’s a short, weak and overused phrase but it’s all she’s got. It’s the only thing she can think of fit for the public sphere and while she’s hiding so much from them.

The Director turns to the crowd and steels herself, peering at the dozens of curious Bureau members. “Everyone is to clear the hangar! This area is off limits to all but bubble personnel!” The Director listens as a wave of complaints roll through the crowd, repeating herself just as sternly and watching everyone slowly make their way out. A few employees, Carey, Killian, No-3113 and Angus hang back as the others leave, trying to peer into the bubble their friends are hiding in.

“Go!” The Director yells again, shooting them all a glare as she feels her throat swell and her voice threaten to crack. She has to get rid of them. Being hounded by their loved ones is the very last thing these three ( _her three_ ) need right now. They can come and comfort them later when they’ve managed to lick their wounds.

“Anyone who remains against Bureau orders faces immediate incarceration and decommission!” Lucretia feels a wave of shame run through her at such drastic action, but it has to be done. After her own escape from Wonderland, the simplest actions were overwhelming, and she’s not letting the three suffer like she did.

The four all trade looks and _finally_ leave, the hangar now desolate besides her, the Tres Horny Boys, and Avi.

“Avi, call the infirmary. We need a three-person transfer, stat.” He’s off like a bullet, leaving just her and her former friends. Lucretia gulps and turns to an exhausted Taako, Magnus, and Merle.

Merle looks at her confusingly, then to Magnus and Taako. “What’s going on? What’d you do?”

“We’re infirmary bound, oldie.“ Taako leans on Magnus. “Not that you can hear that.”

“He-” Lucretia purses her lips. “He can still read.” She pulls a fountain pen out of her sleeve and looks around for something to write on. The Tres Horny Boys, unfortunately, aren't fond of carrying around paper. Lucretia, fortunately, has very little to lose by writing directly on the walls of the bubble. As she writes Magnus watches like a hawk, eyes lighting up at the thought of getting a pen himself and finally being able to communicate again.

_You three are going to the infirmary._

Merle squints and steps closer to the wall to read Lucretia’s spidery writing with his remaining eye. “Well, duh. We’re fucked up and tired. Call the big clerical cheese and tell ‘em to line up healing spells to get us all to normal.”

Magnus and Lucretia look at each other in that moment and share a similar thought. They were two humans with years of their lives sucked away in an instant and somehow Merle thought there was a way to get back to _normal?_ If there was a simple spell in this world that could reverse the damage of Wonderland Lucretia would’ve cast it so fast and often it would turn into a mad chant.

“Normal? Merle... this _is_ your new normal.” She steels herself and begins to write, anger coloring her words and making her press down hard on the pen. Surely he’s just in denial. (When she finally escaped she couldn’t look at mirrors or at her own wrinkled, arthritis-ridden hands for weeks. Not to mention how she tried to ignore the pain in her hips and knees.) She harshly claps the cap back on her pen and hides it in her sleeve again, slowly standing and facing the three. “Follow me outside. Your transfer will be here soon.”


	3. Examination

“Open your mouth.” The cleric says, cupping Taako’s chin. As soon as he obeys they shine a light into his mouth, looking around for anything abnormal. Several other clerics hang behind the curtain separating Taako’s bed from the rest of the infirmary, waiting for the moment to sweep in and poke and prod at him.

“You’ve got one hell of a cavity on your upper left molar, but nothing a quick spell can't fix. Chin up.” He does as asked and makes a face as they start feeling his neck, checking for swollen lymph nodes.

“So what’s the point of all of this? I’m ugly and blind and that’s _it_.” Taako sighs as the cleric soldiers on, telling him to tilt his head left and right.

“The Director requested we perform a full examination on all three of you.” They take the stethoscope off their neck and press the cold metal to Taako’s back without warning. “Deep breath.”

 

* * *

 

In the ‘room’ right beside him, separated by nothing but a pale blue curtain, Magnus is sitting at an examination table in a paper gown (Taako and Merle wore the same thing) and swamped by examiners with eyes like scalpels. They visually dissected him in between questions, heads popping up and down as they furiously wrote on their clipboards.

“Can you say the vowels? A, E, I, O, U, Y?” One of the examiners asks.

Magnus inhales deeply, then exhales slowly. Whatever subtle force he used to push against to speak is gone now, and all he can do is huff as his breath fails to become sound. Someone comes up to him and puts their slender ( _too slender and too cold, he can’t stand how similar their fingers are to Edward’s)_  fingers on Magnus’ throat, asking him to try again. They put pressure on his windpipe and feel for vibrations as he tries to talk again, pulling away and asking him to write down what he feels.

_It feels like you’re trying to choke me._

One of the examiners tsks and asks again, telling him to say what he feels when he tries to speak.

_It feels like whatever I used to speak isn’t there. It’s just air._

“Sounds like an absence of something in his neck.” One of the examiners says and the rest chime in with their agreements. They debate amongst themselves in hurried tones and bursts of eureka until they all quiet down and face him away.

“Magnus, can you whistle?”

“Of course he can whistle, it’s just the compression of air with your lips!”

“Well, then it’s in line with our working theory, isn’t it?”

Magnus wets his lips and watches the two clerics bicker, both of them pausing when he starts whistling a line of ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star’.  

“At least he has that, poor fellow.” One of the clerics towards the back says. Someone standing beside them elbows them and hisses.

“Burnsides? Hello?” The head examiner waves to get his attention. “Can you click your tongue?” Magnus clicks his tongue and all their heads go down, looking at their clipboards and frantically writing. They start talking amongst themselves and one of them asks him to write what he feels again as their theorizing reaches fever pitch.

Before Magnus can get a word down one of the clerics yells loud enough for the whole infirmary to hear “It’s got to be missing vocal cords! Get the numbing agents and prep him for a laryngoscopy!”

 

* * *

 

“What the-?” All the clerics examining Merle suddenly turn their heads toward the sound. “What happened?” Merle pipes up. One of the clerical assistants writes a note and passes it to him.

_The tightwads in EC-1 had another epiphany. Your friend Magnus is getting a big metal thing shoved down his throat to see if he still has vocal cords._

“Oh.” Merle stares at the note as the examiners ask him to tilt his head and stick something cold in his ear.

Merle didn’t know what the Wonderland elves did to remove whatever people sacrificed. He hadn’t given it much thought as Magnus’ pinky was poofed away and his left eye disappeared from its socket. In the moment, he just chalked it up it to ‘magic’ and went back to focusing on surviving.

Now he’s curious, though. What did those two take to disable them like this? More importantly, could it be replaced? Or regrown? If only he paid attention during his introductory cleric classes. Merle never was one for the anatomical part of healing. He just trusted in Pan and his divine grace to repair whatever wounds his friends racked up.

Pan. He hadn’t heard from his deity ever since Wonderland. After everything he’d seen in there it wasn’t a stretch to assume they could blot out the influence of the gods themselves. He hoped that was true. Merle hasn’t felt the light of Pan even after their escape. The world felt like it’d shifted an inch to the left and dropped one degree.

That could just be the effects of all the sacrifices he made in that hellhole. (He had a feeling that wasn’t the reason.)

He doesn’t get much time to follow that train of thought. All the clerics whip their heads towards the curtain as an intern rips it open, yelling something Merle can’t hear and inspiring a frenzy in the team examining him. They keep on talking as someone grabs his shoulder and tries to get him to lie down. He can see their lips moving but can’t make out a word of their frenzied speech.

“I can’t fucking hear, in case you’ve forgotten!” Merle snaps at the crew, yanking a hand off his shoulder and sitting up. “I’m used to being out of the loop, don’t get me wrong, but I think I deserve some explanation here!”

That prompts all the clerics to pause and begin to shuffle nervously. During all their clamoring and yelling they’d forgotten that _when they spoke, Merle would not understand._ One of them coughs and turns to an assistant, asking them to write down their plan and show Merle. The assistant nods and quickly scrawls a note, tearing it off their clipboard and presenting it to him.

_Your friend, Magnus Burnsides, has had his vocal cords removed. We suspect you and Taako have also had parts of your anatomy removed._

Removed.

“Removed?” The word wafts out of Merle like black smoke. He looks up at all the clerics surround him quizzically and says the word again. “Removed? Does that mean they can be regrown? Replaced? I mean- we’re all clerics here, we’ve repaired some bad shit before. This- this is just another spell slot for us to burn.”

The team mutters among themselves before three of them write down a note, each handing their response to Merle.

_We don’t know._

_We’ll have to develop a hypothesis and experiment on you three._

_The team in EC-1 is out of spell slots._

When he reads the last note, Merle furrows his brow. “Out of slots? Has Angus come in with a broken arm 50 times today or something? Kiddo's talented at gettin' hurt, based off all the...” He trails off, crumples up the note, and tosses it away while trying not to think about the implications of the last note too hard.

When someone puts a hand on his shoulder and ask him to lie back this time, he has no qualms obeying.


	4. Work on It

After several hours, the teams of clerics finally finish their poking and prodding of the three patients and migrate to another part of the infirmary to share their findings in clipped, hushed tones. The curtains that form the Tres Horny Boys’ individual examination ‘rooms’ are pulled back and they see each other again.

The first thing Merle does is look to his right, then to his left, and laugh his ass off. Magnus is nearly bursting out of his hospital gown, while Taako is drowning in his own.

“What’re you laughing at?” Taako snaps, then remembers with a huff that Merle couldn’t hear him. “Mag- Oh, wait, what the fuck can you do?”

Magnus leans over to get a better look at Taako and shrugs- only to remember Taako couldn’t see him shrug.

Long after the two realize what Merle was laughing at, he says “It- ha! It looks like the staff mixed up your gowns!”

The three lapse into silence after that. Taako’s ears flick back and forth as he tries to eavesdrop on the clerics on the far side of the infirmary, catching nothing but long medical words and ‘how will they’s and ‘what if’s. Magnus keeps leaning over and staring at Taako, trying to think of a plan to ask the other to switch gowns. If he takes a notebook and pen, writes it down, gets Merle, writes a _second_ note explaining his plan to the man, then takes Merle over to Taako so Merle can voice his plan, then they might able to-

The crowd of clerics suddenly goes quiet, all heads bowed and looked at something in the center. After several minutes of whispers, they finally disband. One of the interns runs out, casting a Haste spell on themselves to move even faster.

Magnus and Merle can’t help but notice all the pained, sympathetic expressions among the crowd.

 

* * *

 

 

When The Director enters several minutes later, the intern at her side is out of breath and all eyes are on her. The crowd slowly parts as she walks up to the head cleric, a gnome with big eyeglasses and an even bigger scowl. “You have examined them?”

“Yes.” The gnome, Dr. Weaver says.

“And what have you found?”

“We felt it was proper to have you present when we broke the news.” Dr. Weaver turns to the three and holds out a note for an intern to take. One grabs it and runs to Merle, holding it up for him to read.

“We have found that vital parts of the patient’s anatomies have been removed. This was not a shock. What was a shock, however, was our inability to heal these anatomies with the magic at our disposal.” The head cleric pauses, taking in the trio’s reactions. Magnus is staring at Dr. Weaver like the gnome just punched him in the face. Merle has snatched the note from the intern and his remaining eye is zipping from line to line. Taako just hugs himself and stares off to the side, utterly unreadable to most.

“There is not a single spell slot left in this room, Madame Director. We have thrown all our arcana and all our talents at this in an attempt to repair it and we have failed. There is nothing we have done that could replace a vocal cord, an optic nerve, or an auditory nerve or begin the process of regrowth. These are infinitely small parts of the massive anatomy of the living being and we have _failed._ We do not understand if this is merely beyond the reach of our currently available magic or if this is simply something that _cannot be repaired_. We have theories there is a curse placed on these three blocking our spells, but we have no way of telling if that is the case at this moment. We’ll keep them under observation and try again tomorrow. Thank you for your time.”

As soon as Doctor Weaver finishes, Merle furiously tears up the note the intern gave him and grabs fistfuls of his own hair, reeling from the news. Taako is as unreadable as ever after a lifetime of practice in front of dozens of caravans. Magnus bows his head, refusing to let the crew who’d poked and prodded at him see his reaction.

Lucretia reads it all, however. The subtle clench of Taako’s teeth and the tightness in his grip. The strained rise and fall of Magnus’s shoulders. “Everyone out.” She turns to the clerical crew. “All of you. Get some rest and leave these three be. They’ve had a rough day.” Her gaze is steely as she watches the infirmary staff slowly leave their clipboards and stethoscopes at their stations and leave. The final intern walks out and the door closes, the sound echoing through the now-empty infirmary.

Lucretia sighs, turning back to the three. “Let’s get this over with.” She sets her staff aside and begins dragging four chairs together as her joints scream in agony. These were her boys. They deserved to look her in the eye and hear her voice as she said it. “Magnus? Can you come here please?”

He looks up and nods, taking a seat in one of the chairs.

She goes up to Taako, holding out a hand for him. “Taako, please, take my hand. There’s some chairs in the middle of the room and I want to talk to you all at once.” He holds his hand out, not searching for Lucretia’s own. She takes his hand and loops their arms, leading him to circle of chairs once he’s hopped off the examination table. (His head is hanging the entire time. Lucretia can feel her heart sink into her gut.)

Merle is already in the circle by the time Taako is seated, tapping a pen against a notepad almost out of pages.

She takes her seat and the notepad with a soft ‘thank you’, looking from Magnus, to Merle, to Taako. There’s so much she wants to say. There’s so much she regrets. There’s too little time and too few words and too few pages to apologize.

Lucretia blinks and her vision finally clears, the notepad in her lap dappled with tears. She tears away the soggy page and the page beneath that. And the page beneath that. And beneath that, and beneath that, and beneath that, until she was staring at the cardboard backing of the notebook. She stares at the backing, almost giggling at how well it fit her current speechless deposition. With a crack of her knuckles, she uncaps the pen, saying the only thing she can think of right now.

_I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, you three. I wish this hadn’t happened._

She repeats it for Magnus and Taako to hear as she hands the cardboard backing to Merle. “I’m so sorry. I- I knew you’d experience losses in Wonderland but- this. I can’t believe I was so _stupid_ I didn’t anticipate this. I spend months preparing you to go into Wonderland... And I... I never prepared anyone for when you would return.”

Taako and Magnus are glaring daggers at her, Magnus’ teeth are grit and Taako shoots to his feet. “Did you not expect us to come back?!”

“No! I pushed you for months so you _would_ come back! I- I just didn’t expect them to do _this_.”

“What the fuck were you expecting, then?! We’d walk out smelling like roses?!” His voice cracks as he recalls the rose garden. It was the last thing he ever saw in his entire life. (Maybe that’s why it was so beautiful.)

“I was expecting you to come back like me! I...” She sighs, composing herself. “I left Wonderland without several things. My ambidextrousness. The dexterity in my hands. The-"

They didn't have to hear that yet. Everyone would know in a few months, anyway. "-Dozens of treasured items. Memories. Twenty years of my life. I... I was an idiot and I was narrow-minded and I was- I should’ve been prepared for this. I should’ve been prepared for a million different things but I was so- so _stupid_  that all I could think about was making you survive Wonderland without thinking about how you would survive life after Wonderland. I’m sorry.”

All three of the boys are silent. Magnus rises and grabs a notepad off a doctor’s abandoned station. As quickly as he can he copies down what Lucretia has said. The words seem to swim as they leave his pen. E’s become a’s and g’s become p’s as he tries to copy down her speech, eventually giving up with a huff and tearing out the page, walking over to the woman and holding out the notebook.

“Thank you, Magnus. I’m sorry I forgot to write.” She copies down her speech word for word, handing it to Merle and composing a second note as he reads.

_I’m sorry I didn’t plan for this. The least I can do is help you three adjust. I can teach you lip reading, Merle, and anything else you ask for._

“Magnus, Taako...” She looks to each of them. “I... I can’t take back what I didn’t do before you left. But the least I can do is help you adjust. I can teach you... Braille and sign language and Morse code and anything you ask for.”

Magnus and Merle share a look while Taako picks his nose. “You know what be great?” Taako flicks a booger into the center of the circle. “Getting paid for getting the sixth trinket in the bag. And dinner. Apparently, you’re not supposed to eat during an examination and I am S to the T to the A to the _starving_.” Magnus nods in agreement.

“Of course. I’ll get you whatever you want, then you can rest here. Or as restful as you get in here. I’m sorry you can’t just go back to your suite.”

“What? Why?” Taako furrows his brow.

“Your living quarters were reviewed and deemed-”

“Deemed?”

“Deemed unfit for your current health status. Taako- your room is an absolute hazard. We can’t lose our only reclaimers-” Lucretia pauses, taking a breath before her voice cracks. “We can’t have you injured because you trip and land on something dangerous like a wine bottle- a-and why do you have so much wine your room? With only one party in your living quarters who can hear you and help you- you’re too precious to this operation. To me.”

Taako didn’t know what to think. She thought he was stupid enough to die in his room. She cared about him enough to not let it get a fraction of a chance to happen. Did she really care about him, though? Or did she just care about what he could _do_? People bullshit him with words before and they would do it again. That’s how his world went round... Right?

Taako shifts in his seat, reaching up for one of his copper earrings. “Why? Uh- explain.” He makes a vague gesture. (He hopes she doesn’t catch it’s the hand movement for Detect Thoughts.)

“Simply put, your room is a massive tripping hazard-” Taako can hear the scritch-scratch of pen on paper as she copies down everything she says word for word. “-And there’s no visual cues for Merle in case of fire or something as simple as someone ringing the doorbell. We can move you back to your assigned quarters after the local sawbones poke you enough to make sure you’re not cursed - you aren’t - and they’re satisfied with their mad theories.”

Magnus waves and holds out a hand out, wordlessly asking for the notebook.

“Oh-” Lucretia tears out the pages she’s written on and hands them to Merle.

 _What about me?_ Magnus holds out the page, his big, heavy-handed writing taking up most of the space.

“Well, you seem to be doing alright with writing-”

Magnus gives her a skeptical look.

“Er... alright enough?”

Magnus gives her a more skeptical look.

“We’ll... work on it.”

He rolls his eyes and nods.

Merle raises a hand. “You mentioned food earlier. When do we get that?”

Lucretia takes the notebook back and writes a lone word, tearing out the page and presenting it to Magnus and Merle as she says it out loud for Taako.

“ _Now._ ”


	5. Can't

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Minor warning for blood and injury. Italics indicate words spoken by Magnus via the BoPT. If there are readability issues I'll edit the BoPT dialogue for easier comprehension.

Magnus stares at the ceiling of the infirmary, then at the clock above the exit: 3:59 AM.

He still hasn’t gotten a wink of sleep. To his left, Merle looks just as sleepless as him, sitting up in his hospital bed and staring into space. Magnus wants to ask Merle how he’s taking all this, but he can’t. He can’t ask Taako if he’s alright. He can’t ask Lucretia about Cam. Or the helpful Red Robe. He can’t do so many things now. In a few short hours, the world went from being full of possibilities to be full of ‘ _can’t’_ s.

Can’t tell the doctors to _stop touching him already_.

Can’t converse with Lucretia and the others.

Can’t ask Merle what’s going on.

Can’t ask Taako if he’s asleep or if he’s as restless as them both.

He can’t _ask_ Taako... But he still has eyes and legs. He can still _check_ on Taako. Magnus sits up, his newly aged joints aching in protest as he did so. Merle seems minimally interested when he sees the 40-something human cross his line of sight, watching him for a few seconds before sighing and throwing his blankets back, trying to get out of bed himself. The dwarf’s feet hit the floor and he freezes in place, staring at the tile while Magnus bends down behind him and spies on Taako.

Taako’s bed looks like a hurricane hit it. The paper-thin mattress is threatening to flip right out of the bed frame. His blanket twists around him like a snake and his over-sized hospital gown sprawls over the foot of the bed. Boxes of the oriental take out they ordered hours ago became accents in Taako’s ‘masterpiece’, decorating the foot of the bed and hovering in the elf’s reach for later. (Magnus didn’t eat that night. His throat was sore after several hours of getting metal tools shoved down his gullet and after having an important organ ripped out of his neck he was on edge doing something as simple as swallowing his own spit.)

Magnus gets an eyeful of the elf’s bare ass as he gets closer, kneeling to see Taako staring into space and clinging to a pillow with a large drool spot on it. Overall, his expression was no different from when Angus tried to talk about something besides transmutation spells. Magnus opens his mouth to whisper to Taako and seeing if he’s really awake... only to realize he can’t.

Behind him, Merle finally stands up and heads for the exit, nabbing some schmuck's clipboard to jam the door open as he goes. Magnus considers going after the other, only for a voice in the back of his mind to tell him he should do something with his precious few seconds of privacy. But what? There’s not much he can do. He can’t shake Taako awake and have some secret conversation about-

 _The Band of Projected Thought._ Taako’s shit is under his bed. He can take the Band of Projected Thought while Taako is asleep! Is Taako really asleep, though? How can he check without waking the other? Shit, should he wait for Merle to come back?

Naw. Too much thinking in too little time.

Magnus gets on his knees, ignoring the dull pain in his lower back as he presses his head to the floor, trying to pick out the other’s Bag of Holding in the low light and the utter mess that was Taako’s inventory. He soundlessly groans and thinks of a few select swears as he reaches further under the bed, his hand landing on the Bag of Holding just as another hand lands on top of his head.

“Mmmmmm.... Ma-” Taako groans again, lifting his head slowly and trying to look around. Magnus can practically map the other’s internal thoughts. A split-second of grogginess, a split-second of confusion at why his eyes were open yet he couldn’t see anything, a split-second of panic at the fact _he can’t see anything_ , and a final fraction of a second when it all comes rushing back and he remembers. “Mag? Merle? Ugh... Whichever fucker it is, you have better got a great explanation for going through my shit.”

Shit. Magnus can’t tell Taako it’s him. Hell, even if he wrote it down Taako couldn’t read it, and Merle is still wandering the grounds doing God knows what...

Shit.

Magnus freezes in place, hand still on the Bag of Holding and Taako’s hand still buried in his (thinning) hair. Taako sighs, leaning forward and feeling around Magnus’ face, pausing when he gets a handful of sideburns. “Maggie?”

Magnus nods. That’s one thing he can do.... To counter the hundred and one things he _can’t_ do.

“Explains the silence. Get Merle over here so he can read aloud, won’t you? I wanna hear your evil scheme.” Taako groans and sits up, shifting the blanket around to preserve his last shred of modesty.

Magnus doesn’t stand up and go get Merle. Instead, he rushes through his original plan and yanks Taako’s bag out from under the bed, plunging his hand into the bag and noisily searching for the band. Taako furrows his brow and tightens his grip on Magnus’ sideburns, ears twitching as he picks up the sound of items getting shoved aside by the man’s meaty hand. “What the fuck are you doing, Mags?! Get out of my shit!”

Magnus keeps on searching through the bag.

“ _Magnus!_ ” Taako leans over the other side of the bed, feeling for an umbrella that isn’t there. (The medical staff whisked away all their weapons while they were stripping the three down for their examinations. Right now the Umbra staff is in Intern Eiffel's cubby, along Railspitter and a war hammer.) Magnus keeps on searching, his heart racing now that Taako was on the edge of punching him in the dick for invading his privacy after a day with invasion.

“Get your mitts off my hard-earned shit! I busted my ass stealing all that!” Taako springs at Magnus as he rips the Band of Projected Thought out of the bag. Magnus’ head hits the leg of Merle’s bed just as Taako’s knuckles hit his face “Get out of my-AHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

Taako is Magnus’ friend. You don’t travel the world and live on the moon with something you don’t like. Even if you do, you start liking them around the third month so you don’t strangle each other in your sleep. But once your friend punches you in the teeth, (which is great aim for a blind man, Magnus will admit) all bets are off. Before the taste of blood starts blooming in his mouth, Magnus grabs a handful of Taako’s hair and smashes his face into the tile in retaliation, kicking the wizard away and shoving the BoPF on his head as the wizard clutches his nose and screams.

 _I was doing something fucking helpful!_ Magnus screams into Taako’s mind, the taste of blood now thick and heady in his mouth as pain radiated through his face.

“Fuckin’ Christ!” Taako clamps a hand over his nose, blood seeping out of the spaces between his fingers. “You couldn’t wait until morning?! When Merle could write something up and you could just ask me?!” He tries to wipe away the gushing blood oozing into his mouth with every word.

_I didn’t think of that, alright?! It’s been a shit day and I haven’t gotten a wink of sleep!_

“And it hasn’t been a shit day for me?! I was dying in Wonderland half the time and I got felt up by the sawbones just like you!”

_You’re not a mute forty-something full of aching joints!_

“And you’re not blind and ugly! Do you know what I’ve been through in the last 12 hours?!”

_The exact shit as me! I can’t give a toast at my best friends' wedding anymore! How do you honestly think I feel right now?!_

That shuts down Taako’s argument. Whether he couldn’t find a counter or refused to reveal what he felt remained unsolved. After several seconds frozen in place, he gropes around for something to bleed onto, and Magnus hands him his threadbare blanket. “Thanks.” Taako says weakly as he tries to mop up the mess that now made up the lower half of his face.

_Sorry about hitting you._

There’s a long silence before Taako speaks. “Sorry about... Ya’know.”

They both sit and bleed until Merle walks in several minutes later, turning on the lights and sighing when he sees his friend’s states. “Pan tap dancing on a pin, I was only gone for 20 minutes!”

“We’ve done worse in- oh yeah, you can’t hear that.”

 _We’ve done worse in 20 minutes._ Magnus conveys to Merle, smirking when the dwarf jumps back like he’s been hit.

“Mangus...? What... What did you do? I- I just _heard_ you. In my mind.”

 _Band of Projected Thought._ He taps his new (and likely permanent) accessory.

Merle squints his remaining eye, stepping closer before he sees the band hiding in Magnus’ hair. “Damn thing’s the same shade as your hair. Didn’t see it there, Mags.”

“When you get done gawking, can you maybe heal us? I’m down to nothing but hearing and touch over here!” Taako says, blood oozing out of his nose the second he pulls the blanket away.

 _We hit each other. Taako needs healing._ Magnus pointed at Taako, trying to ignore the bitter taste of blood in his own mouth and the pain that now radiated from a single, wiggly tooth.

“Alright, alright. But for god’s sake will you two go to sleep when I’m done? Or at least pretend to?” Merle walked over, rubbing his hands together and whispering a prayer to Pan. He heals them both before kicking Magnus back to his own bed and demanding Taako put some clothes on, sitting on the middle bed and staring at the clock.

 _Hey. Merle._  Magnus ‘says’.

“What?”

_What did you do outside?_

“That’s between me and my God, Burnsides.”


	6. Miscommunication

_Ugh, I thought they’d never stop poking at us._ Magnus blurts out to the other two men as they’re finally released from the infirmary. Taako clings to his left arm as they walk, umbrella slung over his shoulder and hat tugged down in an attempt to not look blind.

“If I never put on a hospital gown again, It’ll be too soon.” Merle says at Magnus’ right-hand side, going through his inventory for the third time in twenty minutes. He didn’t trust those interns to not swipe his shit while he was changing. “Say, did you ever get Railspitter and the Chance Lance back?”

 _Got ‘em right here._ Magus reaches over his shoulder and taps the weapons strapped to his back. _Why do you ask?_

“I lost my hearing, I’m not losing my two grand next.”

_You don’t even have two grand! You spend all our relic money on trips to Neverwinter and plants._

“Oh shut u-” Merle pauses. He’s a deaf man telling a mute man to shut up. “Shut the fuck up, Burnsides.” Then again, Magnus is being a pain.

“That’s the first ‘fuck’ of the day. Congrats, Merle.” Taako drones, somehow sounding the most sleep-deprived of the three when he was 1: an elf, and 2: got more sleep than Magnus and Merle combined.

 _Trust me, I got that award the minute I saw those clerics shuffling back in._ Magnus projects the thought with as much bitterness as he can, scowling as he recalls how they asked him question after question and burned dozens of spell slots on him before throwing up their hands saying it wasn’t going to work. They seemed to be blaming _him_ as they said it. As if it was _his_ fault for becoming mute.

“So do you think this nightmare’s over yet? Or are they gonna mess with our suite until it’s ‘deemed fit’?” Taako wasn’t looking forward to a bunch of peppy know-it-alls in overalls throwing out half the stuff in his bedroom. (Maybe if he blew Brad he’d- no, the guy was too goody-two-shoes and by-the-book to ‘forget’ to give Taako’s room a once-over.)

 _With how everything’s shaken out since we escaped Wonderland, they probably threw out everything we owned and ‘remodeled’ the place behind our backs._ Magnus says, pressing the ‘down’ button on the elevator that leads to their suite and stepping inside with Taako.

“With how everything’s shaken out since we escaped Wonderland...” Merle says, following Magnus into the elevator.

“Magnus already said that, Merle.” Taako tries to interrupt. However, the two end up talking over each other and their words become confused gibberish.

 _Merle, I already said that._ Magnus interrupts.

“...remodeled’ the place behind our- Oh? You did?” Merle gives Magnus a confused look. “Really? I didn’t hear anything.”

“Probably because the Band of Projected Thought only works on one person at a time, dumbass.”

 _Merle can’t hear you, dumbass._ Magnus says to Taako, then turns to Merle. _Taako says the Band of Projected Thought only works on one person at a time, dumbass._

“Well, tell that dumbass I couldn’t hear him!”

“He already told me that, dumbass!” Taako leans over so Merle can see him shouting.

Merle narrows his eye then looks up at Magnus. “Alright, I’m lost, what’d he say?”

Taako and Magnus groan at the same time, rolling their eyes and facepalming before they both repeat themselves to Merle. The elevator finally opens and they all start walking out.

_Taako said he already said that._

“I already said that!”

“Said what?!” Merle shouts at them both, triggering another round of groaning.

“That you couldn’t hear me!”

_That you couldn’t hear Taako._

“I’ve got a brilliant idea! Let’s never talk to each other like this again.” Merle grumbles as Mangus opens the door, freezing when he sees what’s inside.

“What’s going on? What’s happening?” Taako asks, turning to Magnus.

Their suite is practically untouched. The welcome mat is still out of alignment with the door. There’s still mud stains leading from the front door all the way to Magnus’ room. The couch and the coffee table still look like a hurricane hit them (and there’s likely still a tube of lipstick shoved between the cushions). The coffee table still has Merle’s half-eaten breakfast on it. Hell, every single dirty dish is still in the same spot as yesterday morning. Merle and Mangus can’t believe it. It feels like it’s been _years_ since they set foot in this place.

The only difference is the eleven-year-old draped over the couch and the robot in one of the overstuffed armchairs. NO-3113 springs up as soon as she sees the three, yelling “They’re here! They’re alive and they’re here!”

In an instant, Magnus’ bedroom door flies open and Carey and Killian rush out. “Magnus!” Carey yells, leaping into the air and hugging the man with all her might. “We were so worried about you three and we were waiting outside so long but they kept on kicking us out and oh my god, are you okay?! What happened?! Are you alright?” Carey pulls away and takes a look at Magnus, her relief turning to concern as she takes in the three’s morose expressions. “Magnus...? What happened? Why are you’re so... old?”

Taako speaks up first, tugging his hat down to hide his eyes. “Kick Agnus out. And no eavesdropping, kiddo.” Everyone looks at the boy detective as he sits up, still groggy and mumbling questions as NO-3113 ushers him out. The second they’ve both crossed the threshold Taako whips around, locks the door after a bit of fumbling, snaps his fingers and casts Silence on the door. “Sorry, NO-3113.”

Taako grabs Magnus’ arm and asks him to escort him to the couch. Carey, Killian, and Merle follow, eventually finding a place to sit. Magnus, Taako, and Merle take the couch, while Carey and Killian face them in the armchairs.

 _Who’s going to tell them? I can’t tell both of them at once._ Magnus speaks into Merle’s mind, then Taako’s.

“Well, I can’t hear them if they pipe up mid-sentence.” Merle leans over and whispers to Magnus.

“Well, I don’t want to!” Taako whispers to Magnus, who then tells Merle.

“You’re kinda our last option here! You just... speak and Magnus’ll translate for me.” Merle whispers.

“You guys owe me.” Taako sighs and the three pull away from each other. “Okay...” Taako groans, whipping off his hat and facing to the left of Carey and Killian. (Magnus tilts his chin until he’s facing them head-on.) “I’m blind.” Taako points at himself. “He’s mute but he’s got a headband that lets him talk to one person at a time with his mind.” Taako jabs his left elbow into Magnus’ chest. “And he’s deaf.” Taako jabs a finger at Merle.

He pauses and listens to the couple’s reactions. Carey lets out a heartbroken whine and shifts in her seat, then there’s another sound Taako assumes is Killian hugging her. “Is... is that everything? Er- besides Magnus being old?” Killian asks.

“Of _course not."_  Taako launches into the story of their time in Wonderland, telling the couple about how he admired the elves for a split second, only for that admiration to turn to burning hatred as they fought their way through a monster factory, met a man who was nothing but a head, sacrificed again and again at that damn wheel, went through the strangest dating game he’d ever seen, and eventually ended up in that endless hall as Lydia and Edward planned their fates and betrayed them in the end. He omits everything about how Lucretia betrayed Cam, the mysterious force that helped them, and how Magnus lost his memory of Governor Kalen, instead saying Magnus lost the memory of his first pet (Taako said it was a very angry cat.) By the end of the story, Taako feels just as exhausted and hurt as the first time it happened, sinking into the couch and telling Merle and Magnus to continue for him.

There’s not much to say in the end. Carey and Killian give the three their condolences, promise to stay by their sides and help the three in any way they can.

Magnus jokes they can clean Taako’s room and earns a smack from the wizard. Merle says they clean the entire suite and earns several groans from Carey and Killian. Taako suggests they eat and hit the hay.

In the end, they go with Taako’s idea, scarfing down cheap, boxed lasagna (or in Magnus’ case, very watery soup) and crashing hard, eager to sleep in their own beds for the first time in what felt like years.


	7. Angus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to my beta reader, Neighborhoodghostboy!

It’s 5:30 AM at the Bureau of Balance headquarters. The cold, recycled air is unmoved by any active bodies going from dome to dome, as all the graveyard shifts have crawled into bed and all the morning shifts are sipping coffee at their stations. Sunlight slowly washes over the base, increasing in color and saturation until the Bureau library is painted several inviting shades of orange.

Inside the library, tucked into a corner with the sturdiest table and the comfiest chair is a veritable mountain of books. The unsteady stacks are stuffed with medical journals, dictionaries, self-help books, books about grief and moving on and manilla folders on survivors of Wonderland. One lone fiction book _, Caleb Cleveland, Kid Cop #25: The Shadow Walker's Plea_ , is tucked under the cheek of a sleeping, drooling Angus McDonald. (Lucretia had pulled a few strings planetside and gotten Angus a copy of the latest book in the Kid Cop series before it was released to the general public.) He’d tried to read a few pages to take his mind off the all-consuming anxiety that had shaken him ever since he was ousted from the Tres Horny Boy’s suite, but he only got to the second page before he slumped over.

Right now, the constant ringing of his Stone of Farspeech is dragging him from his uneasy sleep inch by inch. Angus groans and squeezes his eyes shut tighter, shifting around until he realizes what’s ringing and bolts upright, scrambling to grab his Stone and answer it. “Hello? Suh-Sir?! Ma’am?! I’m sorry I took so long to-!”

“Kid. Please. Indoor voice.” Taako groans on the other end of the line and covers an ear. “I just woke up, cool it on the volume.”

“Taako! You’re- you’re alive!”

“Yes, I am. At least on the outside. I’m still dead on the inside, kemosabe.” The wizard flops back onto his pillow with a grunt. “Don’t think about that too hard, Mr. Overthinker.”

“I’m- I-I don’t overthink!” Angus shoots to his feet, knocking over a tower of books and jumping out of the way just in time to avoid being buried by a 12 volume series on grief.

Taako snickers on the other end of the line as he picks up the sound of hardbacks hitting the tile. “Library?”

“...Yes.”

“Didja fall asleep in there again or was this an early morning trip?”

“I uh... I got up early.”

“Uh huh.” Taako says with a hint of amusement.

“Honestly! I did! I woke up really... really.... Early.”

“‘Very early’, huh? Why’d ya do that kiddo?”

“I wanted to brush up on my spells before we started training ag- no wait I- I uh- I wanted to reread my favorite book in the Kid Cop series!”

“Riiight..."

“...IIIII fell asleep in the library for the third, no wait, fourth night in a row.”

“Uh huh. Hey, how about you skip putting away the hundred or so books you’re probably buried in right now and come over? I-” Taako knows he’s going to regret this. “I wanna talk to you. About things and stuff.”

Angus feels a stab of dread go right through him, forcing him to grab onto the table ledge as adrenaline stirs in his veins and his guts tie themselves in knots. “Sure. Be there soon. Love you.” He hangs up immediately and takes a deep breath, trying not to think about the lump forming in his throat. Taako talked to him. That Taako meant was still alive. (Of course, he was still alive! He walked into his own suite yesterday! People don’t die overnight unless Angus has a new case to solve.) Taako is still alive. No matter happened in Wonderland and no matter what happens now, Angus has that. For however long he has it.

He feels bad about leaving half the medical section for the librarians to reshelve, but his hands are shaking so badly he doubts he could do it himself. Angus’ heart is hammering in his chest as he heads out of the Bureau library and towards the Tres Horny Boy’s suite. He tries to think about what could be wrong based off everything he’s seen. He ends up thinking a hundred thoughts at once and they collapse into themselves as his brain turns to static. He’s trembling and he knows he should sit down but he’s in the elevator to the Tres Horny Boys suite before he knows it. (He can’t remember walking to the elevator. He feels like he watched himself walk more than he felt himself walk.) Angus breathes deeply for the first time in forever and he shudders. What if Taako is dying? What if the others are dead? What if he’s dying? He can’t

(He can’t remember walking to the elevator. He feels like he watched himself walk more than he felt himself walk.) Angus breathes deeply for the first time in forever and he shudders. What if Taako is dying? What if the others are dead? What if he’s dying? What if the stress finally killed him and he's dying? He can’t breath-. He can’t sense the world around him. He’s not in his head right now. He’s not- He’s not- He’s-

Angus curls up as tightly as he can on the elevator floor, chest snapping up and down as he hyperventilates. His face and fingertips began to feel like pins and needles as he takes in air. Too much air. There’s too much air yet there’s still not enough and oh god he’s gonna die here because he _can't breath_ \--

A square, squat hand pats Angus’ shoulder and he feels all the excess emotion drain out of him. Usually Angus would be jumping away from the unwanted contact by now, but he’s so exhausted all he can do is look up at the culprit.

“Angus.” Merle is kneeling in front of the boy. He pats his shoulder a couple more times and pulls away. Angus instantly picks up on the eyepatch, though in his wound up state he misses dozens of subtle details he could’ve picked up. “You’re gonna be alright.”

“Uh... thank you, Merle. I’m so- so worried about Taako and you and Magnus and... A-A lot of things honestly....” He sighs and curls up tighter. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know if I _can_ do anything and- I’m supposed to do things! I’m the world’s greatest detective and I’m supposed to solve the problems a--and... help people. But I... I can’t. I don’t know what’s going on, or what to do, and- I-I don’t like it. I hate this. I hate this feeling.” Angus sniffles and wipes the tears off his glasses.

Merle nods slowly, looking completely lost at sea, then pats his shoulder again.

“I guess you wouldn’t I-”

“That’s nice an’ all, but I need to take the elevator up. Can you-” Merle points behind himself and to the entryway to the Tres Horny Boy’s Suite.

“Oh.” Angus stands, stammering a few apologies as he walks out and Merle walks in. “Goodbye.” He waves to Merle as the elevator doors close, soon standing alone in the short hall.

There’s nowhere to go but forward. The elevator is still crawling to the surface and the entrance beckons. “Grandpa always said-” Grandpa said a lot of things. When you had a near perfect memory even at age 107, you had a lot to say. There was one quote that Angus felt was fitting for today, however. “On the other side of adversity is the true content of our character.”

Angus takes a deep breath and opens the door. It looks exactly the same as when he left (barring the half-eaten lasagna on the coffee table). “Si- Taako?” He hears a cough in the kitchen and whips his head to see Magnus nursing a cup of coffee (and a killer migraine) all alone. Not in the mood for conversation, Magnus just waves ‘hello’ to Angus and points at Taako’s bedroom door.

“Thank you!” Angus grins and waves back at Magnus before going up to the door, his stomach tying itself in knots again. “You’ll be alright. Whatever’s on the other side of that door- It’s better to confront it than hide from it.” He whispers to himself, a more positive rendition of something his father always told him.

_(Just get it over with, Angus!)_

Without further hesitation Angus grabs the doorknob, opening it in one smooth motion and looking inside. “Taako?”

Taako’s room is still as messy as ever. Angus can’t see the carpet under dozens of rugs ranging from whimsical to gaudy, piles of dirty clothes, spellbooks, dirty dishes, empty wine bottles, and stolen knick knacks Taako swore were important. Smack in the middle of the room is Taako’s bed, a once-regal four poster smeared in ‘Taako charm’.

“Ango?” The wizard sits up in a mismatched pile of blankets, his gaze aimed more at the door than the boy.

”Right here." Angus steps inside, turning on the lights and closing the door. 

“Come here, kiddo.” Taako pats the bed. Angus can see the truth right in front of him but he doesn’t want to believe it. All it took was one look to see that Taako’s- No. He can deny just a few seconds longer. He can live his old life a few seconds longer. Angus walks over and sits on the edge of the bed, looking up at his mentor in silence. “...Well? Taako?”

Taako reaches forward and, for the first since they’ve met, hugs Angus. Angus tenses up at the unexpected contact, then slowly melts into Taako’s warmth and the smooth silk of his sleeves. Taako sniffles and pulls Angus closer, inhaling around a growing lump in his throat- and shoves Angus away. “Okay, that’s enough touchy-feely shit.”

Angus scooted away from Taako, an expectant look in his eyes. "So, what did you want to tell me? Are you okay?" He laughed nervously, still holding onto that sliver of hope, the one piece of calm before the inevitable storm.

"Well, there's no easy way to say this, pumpkin. I'm as blind as a bat, visions kaput. No more seeing for this elf. Capiche?"

Angus knew it was coming the first time he saw Taako’s eyes, milky colored and as iridescent as pearls. He knew when Taako looked at what he could hear, not what he should see. He knew it was coming. He knew, but it didn’t make it any easier to swallow. Angus doesn’t realize he's let out a sob until Taako is shushing him and pulling him in for a hug again.

“Shhhhh. Shh shhh shhhhhh. It’s okay, Angus. It’s okay.” A ring-laden hand runs through the boy’s hair as he tries to squirm away, wiping at his eyes.

“No! No, it’s not. I shouldn’t be crying!” Angus sniffles again, taking off his glasses. “I-I’m not the one who’s blind forever! I- I shouldn’t even cry. Wh-why cry when I’m not even the one who’s hurt?”

“Angus.” Taako squeezes the boy closer to his chest, trying not to think about the tears and snot on his nightgown. “I might be the one getting the shit end of the stick here but I’m not the only one getting hurt. I’ve got... He pauses for a while, pulling Angus into his lap.

“I’ve got friends who are hurt, too. Not because ‘ _Oh no, now I have to put up with a blind shitwizard'_ but because... They care about me, and when I’m hurt, they feel that ache right beside me.” Taako can’t believe what he’s saying. He would’ve never survived jumping from caravan to caravan if he was this soft back then.

“Yeah...” Angus says.

“Prime example right here.” Taako ruffles his hair. “I’m hurt. I really am. I gambled for something different than this and I got duped at the last second.” Taako presses a kiss to Angus’ forehead. “No matter if I got what I wanted that day or not, we’d still have to adapt. So how about you put that big brain to use and help me learn how to live to flip another day. Think you can do that, Ango?”

“I think so, Taako.” Angus hugs Taako back.

He tries to ask Taako a million and one questions about Wonderland and what went down inside it, but he’s asleep before he can mumble his first one and ends up tucked into Taako’s bed.


	8. Dammit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the delay in posting this chapter. I have no excuses. The next chapter is research intensive and may take some time as well.

“If I had so much as a drow dime for every time I told you this, I’d be rich enough to buy out this entire goddamn moon base and paint it pink! You can't wear the band every hour of the day. That's just impractical as fuck, magic needs a recharge just like you. You're wearing that thing to pieces and it's just gonna up and break on you if you don't give it a rest. Magic is exhausting as hell, that's why you don't see me pumping iron like a lunatic. Magic drains, my dude. It's a cruel mistress."

Takko’s muffled voice filters into the room Angus has been sleeping in. He wakes slowly, the smell of unwashed hair and sheets hitting him first. The second thing to hit him is his lack of glasses and shoes. There are only two ways that could go: Either Taako was fucking with him and threw his shoes in the kitchen sink, or he cared about him enough to go through the trouble of making him as comfortable as possible. Angus has a feeling it began as the latter, then morphed into the former.

There’s more indistinct conversation that Angus doesn’t bother tuning in to, too busy searching for his glasses. He doesn’t want to stand up to look for them only to hear an unfortunate crunch. (Again. He went up to The Director holding the broken frames like a dead pet and could barely ask for her help through his tears.) Agnus gropes around the mountain of blankets and feels nothing but endless textures and weights of fabric.

“If I were Taako...” He’d leave the glasses on the nightstand. Right where he thought Angus would put them. The boy reaches over and feels the wire-thin metal of his spectacles in seconds, putting them on and sliding off the bed to pick his way across the dirty room. The smell of pancakes and maple syrup smacks him in the face as soon as he opens the door. His stomach rumbles and all the adults (sans Merle) turn to look at him.

“Agnus! You’re up!” Carey springs out of her seat to walk over and hug him. Magnus drops his head to the counter as Carey speaks, attempting to use two pancakes as earplugs.

“Good mornin’, Carey. Why’re you two here?” Angus mumbles.

“Cus we wanna be here, Ango.” She ruffles his hair then tries to style his bedhead into something presentable.

“Magnus set the stove on fire and Taako begged us to come over so they could eat real food.” Killian says, depositing another pancake on a waiting plate.

“Hey! I don’t beg!” Magnus flinches as Taako raises his voice, groping around and trying to cover his mouth. “I- Maggie! -I _suggested_ the lovebirds come- Mags! Fuckin’!” He smacks Magnus’ hand away. “I suggested they come over, no big biz, off-the-cuff kinda thing and they practically-” He smacks Magnus’ hand again. “-Practically ran over here!” Taako grabs Magnus’ hand and holds it away from his face “Geez, I get it. Migraine. Quiet time. Stop tryin’ to stuff your fingers in my face. I’m not a goddamn alarm clock.”

“Good morning, everyone,” Angus says, waving to the three. Should he tell Taako he’s waving? Would that be condescending? Or is he supposed to narrate his actions? Can he walk up to Taako or does he have to announce himself? Are the other two blind as well? Is it rude to ask? Or is it ruder to _not_ ask? Does proper etiquette even matter with the Tres Horny Boys? Oh, forget it, he can try once and if it doesn’t work he’ll never do it again! “I’m waving, by the way.”

“That’s cute, pumpkin. Get over here and laugh at mundane Mango with me.” Taako gropes around for the seat at his left, then pats it.

“That’s a pretty big dick move, Taako. Even for you.” Angus walks over, taking a plate from Killian with a soft ‘thank you’ and sitting beside his mentor

“Psh, he’s the one who forgot about item cooldowns. Now he’s gotta write notes while we stand around waiting for the thing to recharge.” Taako stabs through all the pancakes on Angus’ plate and drags them to his own.

“Notes?” Notes. Band of Projected Thought. And the fact he hadn’t heard Magnus so much as groan all morning... “Is- Um. Taako?”

“Hm?” The wizard looks over to Angus, his gaze hanging about three feet over the boy’s head. “What’s up?”

“I-I...” Angus can feel his hands trembling as he tries to steal back a pancake. “I- is it rude to ask what your.... Uh-”

Taako arcs his head in an over-exaggerated eye roll. “Spit it out, kiddo. What our disabilities are?”

“Yeah...” Angus doesn’t notice Merle behind him, stealing his pancake and replacing it with a half ate sausage.

“You don’t have to soap opera it. Merle’s deaf- not that he fuckin’ listened to begin with- and Magnus is mute.” Taako gropes the air for a few seconds, then ruffles Angus’ hair. “But I’m sure you figured that out with your big ol’ boy brain.”

“I had a theory.” His fork hits bare ceramic and he looks down, then jerks his head towards a smirking Merle. “Hey!”

“Gotcha.” Merle chuckles to himself as he returns Angus’ food to its rightful plate.

“So you’re-” Angus fishes out a notebook and pen, writing in a tiny, crisp script.

_So you’re deaf?_

Merle leans over and narrows his eye, looking up at Angus, then back at the page presented to him. “Duh. And write bigger, won’t you? My eye is almost as shit as my ears are.”

Angus quickly scribbles an apology and presents it to Merle.

“Hey!” Taako shouts. Magnus is playfully trying to elbow Taako out of the way so he can snatch Angus’ notebook and Taako is elbowing him back. “Just ask the ki- oh.” He sighs and leans back long enough for Angus to hand Magnus a second notebook and a pencil.

“Told you they’d kill each other without us.” Cary says, kissing Killian's cheek (and stealing the bacon off her plate).

“They’ll kill each other _with_ us around. Somehow.”

Angus pulls out a spare notebook and hands it to Magnus, who slips it into his back pocket. He grabs the edge of Taako’s plate and soundlessly moves it away while the man’s fork is in the air. Taako jabs at bare table and huffs, whipping his head left to right. “Okay, which douchebag was it?!”

“Magnus did it!” Angus points to the man as his expression shifts from mirth to betrayal. Magnus mouths the word ‘traitor’ at Angus right before Taako smacks him.

“Asshole. Now gimme back my breakfast.” Magnus rolls his eyes and slides the plate back just as Killian begins to speak.

“Sorry, Taako, there’s no time left. The Director said we needed to be in the library at 11:00 today for basic sign language classes.”

“Nope. Nu-uh. Captain Taako is not fucking sailing to the nerd coop. In case you’ve forgotten, I don’t do the _seeing_ thing anymore. Eyesight’s done its farewell tour and fucked off to fantasy Florida. Why the hell should I attend a hand signal class if _I can’t see the hand signals_?!” Taako throws his hands up for dramatic flair.

“He’s got a fair point.“ Carey shrugs, then dumps her plate in the sink. “We need to head out. Angus? Are you coming with us?” Carey heads to the door, followed by Killian, Magnus, and Merle.

“It does sound interesting. Sure!” Angus scoots back in his seat to follow them, only for Taako to lean over and dramatically drape his arm over his shoulders.

“Ooooh, Ango. Are you really going to abandon your poor, poor magical mentor? The one who's devoted so much time and energy to training you? The one who is now in the need of the most help? It's alright. I get it. Why spend time with the poor, ugly, blind guy when you could be having fun with all your fancy signing friends? I guess I'll stay here. Alone. Left behind.  With nothing but my thoughts and a messy suite full of tripping hazards. Just go! Go and be with your friends! Revel in your ability to walk freely! Or at least as freely as you can without shoes.”

“You threw my shoes in the kitchen sink, didn’t you?” Angus deadpans, brows knitting together.

“Worse.”

“I... I don’t wanna kn-”

“Oven. In a casserole dish fulla’ olive oil.”

“Taako! That’s my only pair of shoes! That’s- Ugh! You’re- you’re a-!” Angus growls, grabbing fistfuls of his hair and squeezing his eyes shut as tightly as he can. “You’re an asshole! A heartless asshole!”

When Angus opens his eyes, his breakfast has been replaced by a shiny new pair of shoes. Okay, maybe not new. Angus has seen these exact shoes floating around in Taako’s sty of a room except they were a men’s size eight. The pair on his plate is several sizes smaller.

“What was that, again?” Taako leans on the table and smirks. His elbow lands in his food, soaking half his arm in syrup.

Angus looks from his mentor to the ‘new’ shoes, then back to his mentor. “You’re still an ass.” He takes the shoes with a note of reluctance, curling up in his chair to put them on. “If you want me to stay, you could just say it. ”

“Those shoes looked older than you, anyway.”

“They are. Were.”

Taako quirks a brow, trying to look over at Angus and missing the mark again. Agnus pushes his chin until Taako’s facing him. “Why the hell are you wearing your granddaddy’s shoes?”

The real answer chokes Angus like bile, forming a lump in his throat so big he wonders how he can breathe around it. He’s silent for a while, breathing as slowly as he can and willing away the feeling. “I don’t have to tell you.”

“Gettin’ a lil’ snappy there, Ango.” Taako says, expecting a reply. It doesn’t come and they both lapse into silence, picking at their food.

“So...” Taako says after a while, hoping he can still save the moment. “I probably shouldn’t have done that, huh?”

“Done  _what_ exactly?” Angus looks over at the other, eyes narrow as pins.

“The shoes and the crappy speech thing...” God, what else does this kid want from him? A genuine apology?

Angus looks back down at his food, eyes still narrowed. " _Why_ shouldn’t you have done that?” He knew getting an apology from Taako would be like pulling teeth. After what he’d done, Angus was more than ready to pull.

“Ugh...” Taako squirms in his seat, trying to think of what Angus would want to hear. “I... shouldn’t have done that because I didn’t know those were important to you. And.... ruining important stuff is bad. I guess.”

“ _Why_ is ruining important stuff bad?”

“Because uh.... Because it’s- it’s irreplaceable? I guess? A-and expensive? Jesus Christ, kid, what do you want from me?”

“A better apology...” Angus mumbles.

“Fine! But how the hell am I supposed to apologize if I don’t know what I’m apologizing for?!”

“Are you that dense?!” Angus snaps, pounding the table with his fist and whipping around to face Taako. The other jerks back with wide eyes and clings to the back of his chair, frozen in place.

“Uh... Sh-shit. Sorry, pumpkin. I didn’t know you had that much stock in those pieces of-” Taako purses his lips and reconsiders his words. “I didn’t know you cared about your old man’s shoes so much.”

“It’s fine. I mean why should I expect someone like _you_ to know what ‘caring’ is?”

“Angus!” Taako snaps back. He can’t see the boy flinch but he can hear his gasp and the smack of his hands gripping the counter suddenly. Damnit. Why’d he try to save the moment? He’s fucked it all up worse than before. “...Maybe you should go.”

“Yeah.” There’s the sound of Angus sliding out of his chair and walking to the door, his footsteps louder now that he was wearing shoes whose soles hadn't been softened by years of travel. Not long after that is the click of the door opening and closing, and the distant, muffled drone of the elevator.

 

“God, damn it...”


	9. In the Library, In the Kitchen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Boy, this one was hard to write. I ended up splitting this chapter into two parts so you all get a double feature today! :D

The Bureau librarians are still restocking the medical section after Angus’ bout of stress-researching when Magnus, Merle, Killian, Carey, and NO-1331 (who had joined them on the way to the library) burst onto the scene in a wave of rowdy conversation and flying elbows. The library staff trade anxious looks and sigh in exasperation before they even catch sight of the five, picking up more medical books and trying to restock faster.

Lucretia is waiting at a round table bathed in sunlight, staring out the window and into space. Her hands are splayed over her blue and white journal and there are dozens of books on sign language at her sides and at her feet.  Magnus and Carey, being rogues used to picking up on details, notice the absence of Lucretia’s omnipresent white oak staff, a mundane wooden cane in its' place. They trade a look and silently agree not to mention it.

“Magnus. Merle. A pleasure.” Lucretia turns to them and gives them both a warm smile, secretly hoping her rigid posture chills her expression. “It’s nice to see your friends, don’t get me wrong, but where’s Taako?” She looks over at team Sweet Flips, writing down every word she speaks without looking and sliding her journal over to Merle.

Merle looks down at the journal and grumbles a complaint about cursive, sliding it back to Lucretia. “Taako said he didn’t wanna attend ‘hand signal’ classes if he couldn’t even see the signals anymore, and Killian was the one who told us to come anyway. Luckily Maggie here turned some bacon to charcoal or they never would’ve been in our suite.”

Magnus shoots Merle a sour look and swats him on the arm, reaching over and snatching Lucretia’s journal in the middle of her sentence. (He takes advantage of her split second of shock to steal her pen, too.)

Magnus takes his time writing, planning out every word before he puts it to paper and writing each letter with careful deliberateness. His writing doesn’t resemble handwriting as much as it resembles a font. Every letter is the exact same carefully drawn shape and every period is a tad larger than it needs to be, just like the spaces between his words.

 _If you_ ~~_wha_ ~~ _wanted to make_ ~~_breakfa_ ~~ _breakfast you should’ve been up DUMMY._ Magnus’ handwriting looks like a train wreck in motion. He writes with a tense grip and a heavy hand, a horrible match for the free-flowing ink of a fountain pen. Every line is a mile wide, spots of ink have forced him to cross out perfectly usable words and, to Lucretia’s dismay, the letters bleed through the current page and into the next one, ultimately leaking through seven pages of her journal.

“You’re always up before the damn sun! Not even a couple of assholes wearing nothing but an inch of organza could stop that.”

Magnus glares at Merle, sticking out his tongue and flipping him off. Lucretia snaps her fingers under the table and wills the journal back to her, slipping a similar red-bound one and a ballpoint pen in front of Magnus before he looks down. He gives the journal a look before shrugging and popping it open.

“Now that I have your attention...” She looks at all five of her new ‘students’, writing upside down and in print so Merle can follow along. “I’d like to make my expectations clear. I am... _horrifically_ sorry that I didn’t see something like this coming and that I didn’t prepare a course like this before you even began training to go to Wonderland. I... Without any hesitation, I call that the biggest mistake of my life. There’s nothing left for us to do but adapt. I want you two and any guests you wish to bring to meet me here every day at 11:00 until further notice. I know I could’ve done so much more to help you three, and I won’t let myself sleep at night until I know I’ve done all I can now.” She slides the journal over to Merle, taking in all their expressions and wondering if she said the right thing.

Everyone is clinging to her every word, whether written or spoken. She hopes she’s doing the right thing. (She knows she is. She should’ve done it sooner.) “I wanted to start with the alphabet, but that’s kind of dumb. There are certain phrases you need right now like ‘eat’, ‘salt’, or-”

Magnus smirks and makes an ‘OK’ sign with one hand and points to it with the other, jabbing his pointer finger through the ‘O’ of his ‘OK’

Lucretia huffs. “-Not that sign. And _this_ is the sign for ‘fuck’ anyway.” She makes peace signs with both her hands and taps her curled up fingers together. The five watching her snicker and practice the sign a couple times. (Sans Merle, who has to wait a few seconds for Lucretia to write out the joke.) “Or at least one of the signs. There are a few sign languages and few signs for each word. It’s _fucking difficult_ to _learn_.” She signs as she speaks the last sentence, making two ‘V’s with her fingers again and tapping them together with the backs of her hands facing up, then hooks the two fingers and holds one hand down and taps her other hand against it before holding one of them out flatly and putting four fingers in her outstretched palm,tapping her wrist to her forehead.

“Hey-!” Carey pipes up. “I’ve actually seen that last sign before.”

“Hm?” Lucretia raises an eyebrow, still transcribing the conversation for Merle.

“It’s a thieves’ cant sign. Usually it doesn't mean ‘learn’ though, it means ‘library’.”

“Well thieves’ cant is utter gibberish that steals from every source around to cobble together a pseudo-language. It makes sense the original meaning would be lost or modified.” Lucretia says.

Magnus turns to Carey and presses all his fingers together before tapping his bottom lip. In thieves’ cant it meant ‘restaurant’ or ‘tavern’, but Lucretia points out it’s a universal sign for ‘food’.

“Maybe now that he knows how to ask for a snack he’ll eat something.” Merle teases Magnus, earning yet another middle finger being pointed at him.

“Magnus? You haven’t been eating?” Concern brushes her features as she turns to look at him.

He shrugs and writes something, crossing out his first two attempts as he adjusts to the quirks of the ballpoint pen (and as a cough makes his lines go off the page).

_I haven’t been hungry._

He slides the journal across the table with a hint of shame, hunching his shoulders as he felt everyone’s gaze burn through him and to his words.

“That reminds me... Merle.” Lucretia writes something and slides it over to the man, the room going silent as everyone tries to read over his shoulder.

_I hate to say this, but my research has shown that ‘lip reading’ is a bit of a misnomer. Correctly determining what someone is saying just by looking at their lips is impossible. A more correct name would be ‘context reading’ or ‘people reading’. Learning to pick up on body language, keywords, and unspoken cues will help you more than trying to determine if someone said ‘it’s’ or ‘fits’._

Merle lets out a ‘hmph’ and picks up the journal, leaning close to block everyone else’s view and reread the passage. “So... what you’re saying is I gotta start paying attention?” He sets down the journal and slides it over to her. She purses her lips subtly and writes, sliding the journal back.

_It’’s less ‘paying attention’ and more ‘paying Angus-levels of attention’. You’ll have to constantly look around and deduce what people are saying. I wish there was something else we could do, but this is what is available to us._

“That’d be a helluva lot easier with two eyes, ya’know.” He tapes his eyepatch. “Hell, maybe even with color vision! I know shades of gray are popular with the ladies, but I don’t see the appeal.”

Lucretia looks lost in thought for a moment, then slides her journal back to Merle after a few seconds, now with something written on it.

_I’ve heard of enchanted glass eyes that can restore one’s vision. Finding them might be hell, though, and they’ll be a pretty copper._

“And?” Merle looks from Lucretia’s journal to Lucretia herself. She wordlessly raises an eyebrow.

“And? C’mon, don’t tell me you didn’t think of it. _Magical glass eye_ ? And we’ve got a _blind wizard_ on our hands? Just give me the ‘do the right thing’ speech- er, essay now and get it over with.”

Lucretia sighs heavily and takes back her journal, writing in brisk, quick strokes.

_He's still unaware of this. I was planning to check up on him after our lesson._

"Well, shit, there goes my shot." Merel grumbles. 

“Yes, and if we’re done- Excuse me.” Lucretia takes her journal back, writing as she speaks.  “If we’re done talking about... Whatever the hell that was, shall we start with the actual lesson? Based off everything you’ve told me, I think we should focus on signs that will be useful in the kitchen. Watch closely, I think you’ll need this one quite a lot.”

 She signs ‘burn’ over and over until everyone has it down, then announces the meaning to uproarious laughter.


	10. Hand Cramp Conversations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been waiting to kick off this plot thread for a while now. ;) Enjoy!

The first lesson is filled with the most kinks to work out. Merle is always one step behind, trying to read the last sign’s meaning just as the next one is shown for the first time. Lucretia passes the duty of transcribing their conversations to Killian, which does ease some of their communication strain; but Killian writes much slower and pars down the endless conversation to what’s absolutely necessary and Merle ends up three steps behind when some offhand joke makes the entire group shake with laughter.

Their enthusiasm for the lesson putters out after three hours and they all unanimously decide to adjourn the meeting and grab some 2 o’clock lunch.  As they rise from their seats and stretch their legs, however, Lucretia stops one of them.

“Magnus,” Lucretia says, leaning forward and placing a hand on his journal. “Please. Stay.”

He slowly sits back down, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Lucretia waits until the other four are out of sight and snaps her fingers, the air around them shimmering for a split second before the background noise of shuffling books and turning pages is muted. She leans forward and writes something as slowly and as carefully as she can, then presents the page to Magnus.

_In the interest of being fair to you, I won’t speak during this. I feel it would be best to give you time to defend yourself._

Magnus’ expression shifts from mere confusion to dread. He watches Lucretia pull back her journal in what feels like slow motion, his chest getting tight as he sees blue ink bloom on the page.

_What did you do to-_

She pulls away before he can read it all, then presents the page again with a desperate addition.

 _What did you do to the guards watching Robbie?_ _PLEASE._   _BE HONEST._

His heart drops into his groin and his stomach fills with thick, black dread. She doesn’t forget anything, does she? Not the water balloon fight in the cafeteria, not the fact he never wiped his feet when walking into her office, and definitely not... this. He shifts in place, leaning over his own journal and wondering what the hell to say. Should he lie? No, she was practically begging him to be honest. But why? Was she- fuck, was she about to jail him? Was something else going on? How did she know it was him? He wishes Angus was here. The kid would be a decent lawyer.

Wait. Angus! What would Angus do? Angus would... ugh, the kid was too damn smart for Magnus to _hope_ to copy him.

Or was he? If Angus was here he would... He would think outside the box. He wouldn’t answer the damn question directly. It made figuring out who got mashed potatoes on the ceiling a real pain in the ass- Wait. What did Angus do that day? If Magnus copies him he might get out of this scot-free.

He adjusts his grip on his pen and recounts that day. He’d just come back from a pretty intense workout and all he wanted was a snack. Angus and Taako had tried and failed to make croquettes and instead made a mess to outdo the Tres Horny Boys Cafeteria Disaster from the year before. Angus promised to tell Magnus the culprit, if only Magnus told him who ate the last of his peach cheesecake. (Taako did both of those things.)

It finally clicks, and Magnus writes slowly, mentally spelling each word over and over in his head so he didn’t mix up any letters and look like a buffoon in front of Lucretia. He slowly turns his journal over, sliding it towards to her with his eyes glued to her face as he tries to gauge her reaction.

_If I tell you the truth, will you tell me the truth back?_

It takes her very little time to write a reply.

_Yes._

_I took them away in my_ ~~_pcoket_ ~~ _pocket workshop. A_ ~~_cimer_ ~~ ~~_chimeer_ ~~ _chimera attacked us and I lost them._

The guilt hits Magnus like a sledgehammer as he slides his journal over to Lucretia. Two people, two lifetimes with family and friends have been wiped away just because of his _stupid mistake_. If he’d done something different in those ten seconds they’d still be alive. (Sure, they’d be pains in the ass to deal with but they’d be _alive_.)

_Thank you for that confession, Magnus. I’ll prepare their Rites of Remembrance._

And just like that, his guilt is wiped away by The Director’s cold, sterile handwriting. The weight of two lives rolls off his back just as easily as ink rolls out of The Director’s pen.

She closes her book and reaches for her cane, rising from her seat slowly. “Thank you. Goodb-”

Before Lucretia can take a step further Magnus shoots to his feet and grabs her wrist. She gasps and her hands light up with magic, anger flashing across her eyes. He mouths the word ‘please’ and lets go of her wrist, slowly sinking back into his seat. She glares at him, slowly sinking back into her own seat. Lucretia takes a deep breath, still staring holes through him.

“Magnus... I understand you wanted my attention, but _do not_ grab me or my hand like that ever again. Please.” He winces as she speaks, writing a quick apology and showing her before diving into what he really wanted to say.

 ~~_We_ ~~ _I saw a Red Robe in Wonderland. He wrote thieves’ cant on my hand and tried to help Merle and_ ~~_Tako_ _Takko_ _Taakoo_~~ _us._ There’s so much else to say Magnus can’t think of what to put down, writing only to furiously scribble out entire sentences. ~~Who was that? Why did they do that? Are some Red Robes good? Why did you tell us to avoid them? What else do you know about the Red Robes~~? He slides the journal over to Lucretia, anxiety tying his guts in knots.

She leans forward and reads his question with a forced impassiveness, tension leaking through in her brow and the way her lips twitch downwards. Her pen hovers over the page for several seconds as she thinks. How can she cram such vast ideas into sentences short enough to be an answer instead of an essay? What can she say to satisfy his curiosity without revealing herself? What’s close enough to the truth?

_The Red Robes were horrible people who made this world burn and suffer. That being said, only a couple were good. You met one of them._

Magnus reads her reply a couple times, dozens of questions old and new bubbling to the surface of his mind. _Who was that? Do you know? How do you know_ _there_ ~~_where_ ~~ _were some good eggs?_

_I fought with the Red Robes for a short time after they released the relics into the world. I tried to stop them and failed._

_Who was that Red Robe? Do you have any idea? Do you know? How do you know?_

_Yes._

Magnus glares at the word. _Yes._ Short, simple, and too damn vague for him right now. He pulls his journal close and underlines something several times.

**_How do you know?_ **

Lucretia hesitates again, gaze flickering past Magnus. _I fought that Red Robe personally._

_When?_

_12 years ago. Right after he brought the Animus Bell into the world._

_What is his name?_ Magnus slides his journal over to her just as his pen rolls off the table. He mentally curses and dips below the table to grab it. When he looks up, Lucretia and her journal are gone. There’s nothing but his own journal on the table, and right under his final question is Lucretia’s final answer.

 

_Barry Bluejeans._


	11. Nobody is Happy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> FULEAO, THIS CHAPTER’S FOR YOU!

_Barry Bluejeans._

Magnus walks out of the library in a daze, looking around for Lucretia from time to time as he heads back to the suite.

_Barry Bluejeans._

The journal Lucretia gifted him is tied to his belt, right across from Steven to balance out the weight of the little guy’s bowl.

_Barry Bluejeans._

The name feels like it’s written in lead. The journal feels so heavy Magnus wonders how he hasn’t fallen through the moon base and smacked into the earth below. 

_Barry_ fucking  _Bluejeans_.

The man they saw  _die_ almost a year ago. He was a Red Robe. Barry was a goddamned Red Robe who got dangerously close to them and to one of the relics he and his buddies made to end the world. (He tries to not think about the fact he was one of those buddies.) Now Magnus is glad they didn’t rescue him back then. Was he the same Red Robe from Capt. Bain’s office? And Lucas’s lab? How the hell was he even there? He’s dead... isn’t he?

The thought alone makes Magnus shudder. It makes him feel nauseous but he knows he has nothing to give up. He’s so hungry. He hasn’t eaten in three days. He can’t even think about food without thinking about choking on it. He’s afraid to eat.

He needs to eat.

He’s so tired. Just walking is making him run out of breath.

He’s sick and getting sicker and he needs to eat.

He’s so sick. 

Magnus stumbles into the elevator in time for a coughing fit to seize his lungs. He can feel foul smelling phlegm crawl up his throat and spits it into a corner, hoping Merle hasn’t taken Lucretia’s ‘pay attention’ speech to heart. Once the fit is finally over Magnus sinks to the floor, clutching his chest and panting. His lungs whistle when he inhales, but no matter how big a breath he takes he never gets enough air. Time seems to crawl to a standstill as he sits there, staring at the elevator clock. (Lucretia once swore it was the only way to make sure the three would be on time for anything. It didn’t work.) Minutes seem to last hours and his head feels like a cloud as he flits through half-finished thoughts.

Barry was a Red Robe. Magnus was also a Red Robe. Somehow.

Barry was the Red Robe who helped them in Wonderland. Somehow.

Magnus tries to think of what the hell Barry could be. What kind of creature could die and come back in such an ethereal form? (They didn’t see him die with their own eyes. Maybe he escaped?) Could he be a vengeful ghost trying to kill them in revenge? A vampire? No, Magnus saw him in broad daylight a few too many times for that theory. A lich? It's a good theory. Were all Red Robes liches? ...Is Magnus a lich?

 He feels his empty stomach tie itself in knots again and decides to stop thinking about it. The elevator dings as it reaches the bottom floor and  Magnus rises to his feet, muscles feeling heavy as he wills himself to exit the elevator and head into the suite common room.

Taako has splayed himself across the couch, clinging to a pair of slimy looking shoes and muttering ‘fuck’ to himself over and over, stretching out the word as long as he can before taking a breath to repeat the process. Merle is sitting in one of the adjacent overstuffed chairs reading  _A Guide to Deduction_ , unaware of Taako’s plight. Magnus doesn’t bother with so much as a hand wave, heading straight to his own room.

He can’t stand being in here, knowing Lucretia will be in the common room any second now.

An idea pops into Magnus’ head. A few of the nature lovers on the base had banded together a few months ago and cultivated a rose garden-

Just the words passing through his mind make Magnus shudder. It wasn’t the same rose garden in Wonderland, he has to remind himself. He used to sit in it after his morning jog. It isn’t the garden in Wonderland. It’s _his_ garden. It’s _his_ garden in _his home_ and he will sit in it and carve some soap and nothing is going to stop that.

 The fatigue sitting in his bones is doing its best, though. Magnus’ gaze passes over his bed and it takes a hefty dose of willpower to keep himself from flinging himself onto it.

_Lucretia will be here soon. Will you be able to sleep, knowing she’s out there avoiding your questions?_  

Magnus walks to the bathroom a bit faster than necessary to grab a new, smooth bar of soap from under the sink, checks he still has his grandfather’s knife, and heads back to the elevator  (while swiping the Band of Projected Thought off the kitchen counter). 

When the elevator doors peel open, both parties see the last people they want to see. Lucretia gasps and Magnus almost drops his knife when they see each other.

There’s a long stretch of silence, both of them afraid to make the first move.

“I...” Lucretia begins. The word hangs in the air without accompaniment.

 

* * *

 

After some time Magnus finally moves, stepping back to allow her to walk out of the elevator. She does so, never taking her eyes off him. He doesn’t take his eyes off her either as he steps into the elevator. The doors seem to move in slow motion, the two stuck staring at each other without anything to say. When they finally close and cut off the two they both breathe massive sighs of relief, Lucretia scurrying into the Tres Horny Boys suite as Magnus sinks to the floor (again).

The entire way up he feels like should’ve done something. Magnus isn’t sure  _what_ , but he could’ve done something. 

He departs from the elevator and heads to the garden with little fanfare. That is until he gets close enough for the smell to waft over him. In an instant, he’s back in Wonderland, surrounded by too many flowers giving off too many scents that mix into a cloying, inescapable cloud. He can see  Lydia and Edward standing there in the same barely-there costumes, his tongue on a platter. Their eyes seem to drill holes through him and can feel his chest seize up with fear, Edward’s ice cold, slender phantom hands crawling up his back and choking him from behind.

 It’s too much, it’s too close to that day, it’s a wound too fresh and he feels like he’s going to vomit from the smell of roses. Their voices trickle into his ears again, those two words ringing out over and over again, Bad luck. Bad luck. Bad luck bad luck bad luck bad luck bad luck bad luck badluckbadluckbadluckbadluckbadluck-

“Magnus?” Small, warm hands pat his shoulder and pull him back to reality. “Are you alright?” Mangus realizes he's dizzy from hyperventilating and there're pins and needles in the tips of his fingers and on his face. He sure as hell isn't 'alright'. Magnus shakes his head and looks around for somewhere to sit. The boy picks up on Magnus’ intentions in a split second and leads him away from the garden and to a simple bench.

“I think you know exactly what I’m going to ask.” Angus stares at Magnus, then at the distant rose garden, mind whirling as theories bubbled in his mind. Did the scent trigger an asthmatic attack? Or a panic attack? Magnus looked like he was panicking earlier, but panicking didn’t explain the whistle Angus could hear in his every breath.

Does he even want to get tangled up in this? He cares about Magnus, but Magnus is a good friend of Taako, and Taako really pissed him off not a few hours ago. Angus knows the right thing to do is stay here and comfort him, but he doesn’t want to right now. “Um... I have to-” He shoots to his feet, pointing in the general direction of ‘away’.  

Magnus plants a hand on Angus’ shoulder.

“Sir, I have to go!” He tries to jerk his shoulder out of Magnus’ grasp only to feel a second hand clamp onto his chin. He lets out a yelp, magic crackling on his skin and filling the air with the smell of ozone. The hand disappears from his shoulder and there’s a blur of motion, Angus raising his arm at the same time Magnus does-

_What’s wrong?_

Angus freezes, the Lightning spell still crackling in his hand. It dissipates as Magnus rubs a thumb over his cheek, the skin still scrubbed raw by tears. Angus feels like he’sbeen smacked. After thinking he’d never hear Magnus’ voice ever again here it is, emanating from inside his head- is he going crazy? Is he assuming Magnus would say that?

_You’ve been crying._ Magnus gives Angus a curious look and tilts his chin so he can get a better look at the boy. Angus finally catches sight of the golden band in Magnus’ hair and it clicks. Not that he cares. Yet.

“No, I wasn’t! A real Mcdonald doesn’t cry.” He wraps both of his hands around Magnus’ own and pries it off his face. “It’s allergies, I swear.”

_For a good detective, you sure are a bad liar._

Angus balks at Magnus, pursing his lips and furrowing his brow as the other’s lips twitch up in a smile. “I”m not lying!” His voice cracks as he yells.

_The hell you aren’t._ Magnus pulls his hand away, looking Angus in the eye as he ‘spoke’. _I know I’m not your go-to for this kind of stuff, but when you’re ready to talk, no matter when that is, I’m here to listen._ (That's all he can do these days anyway.)

Angus jerks back, staring at Magnus like he's grown a second head. He’s glued to the spot, hands still up as if Magnus was about to reach out and smack him. His lips part and close several times, words failing him yet again. He looks away and walks off, arms crossed and head down.

Magnus watches the entire time, turning his attention to the bar of soap in his pocket once Angus is long out of view.

 

* * *

 

It's well past midnight that night when Angus finally takes up Magnus' offer.

“S-uh- Magnus?” The boy’s voice rings through the Stone of Farspeech on Magnus’ desk, yanking him out of his carving streak.

“I know you said when I was ready to talk I could- you know, talk to you. Well, I’m ready now, but I... kind of want someone to be here.” Angus sounds like he’s talking around a lump in his throat. “Could you come here? Please?” There’s some indistinct muttering on the other end of the line before Angus hangs up.

Magnus sighs soundlessly, setting aside the soap rose he had begun to carve and grabbing the Band of Projected Thought. Something tells him it’s going to be a long night.

When Magnus arrives at Angus’ dorm, the door swings open before he can raise his hand to knock. Angus is dwarfed by the door (which still bore the label ‘storage’ underneath a poster Killian and Lucretia drew as a welcoming present for him). As much as the entire Bureau had done their best to dress the room up, it was still a storage room. Magnus fondly remembered taking a sledgehammer to the far wall to put in a window and (not so fondly) the literal pain in the back that installing carpeting proved to be.

Not only had Magnus built the room, he’d built everything in it. He could take one look at Angus’ bed, his wardrobe, his blanket chest, his desk and chair, his bookshelf and tell you exactly what wood it was made of, how many hours he spent carving designs into the wood to dress it up, and how many times he’d banged his thumb nailing it together.

Before that, Angus lived in Lucretia’s quarters, sleeping on the couch and eating breakfast with her and Davenport. (He still did almost every morning. It was the only way those two would remember to eat.)

“Sorry for calling this late. I can’t sleep and The Director says talking about things is important, but she looked upset and tired when she went to bed and I don't want to wake her.” He steps back, opening the door wider for Magnus to enter. The man walks in, sinking into the desk chair while Angus sits on the bed. There’s nothing but unease on the boy’s face as he mentally prepares himself to say what’s on his mind, finally spitting it out after Magnus mimes a cough.

“Does Taako not like me? I don’t know what to think about him sometimes. He acts like he likes me, then he turns around and does dumbass shit like- like this morning! He-” Angus huffs, pulling out a damp handkerchief and sniffling as he tried to dry his red, puffy eyes- “He just.... He keeps on destroying everything I have left of my grandfather. Does he even know he’s doing it? Does he even care? Does he... does he hate me that much?”

Angus’ shoulders slump as if he’s let a boulder roll off his back. Magnus can’t believe what he’s hearing. He wasn’t in tune with whatever Taako and Angus did for ‘magic lessons’, but seeing Angus like this and hearing him... It made him wonder.

“My grandfather is- was the only good family member I ever had. And...” Angus sniffles again. “I'm running out of things to remember him by. And it’s all Taako’s fault. I-I don’t know wh-what to do! Is- is he just that stupid or does he genuinely hate me? Should I- I stop talking to him? What- what would that even do? I-I- I have.... nothing left of my grandfather. But I’m still afraid. I-” Angus takes a deep breath, the lump in his throat swelling as he inhales and turning into a forlorn wail as he exhales. His lips contort into an ugly frown and he presses the balls of his hands into his eyes as he weeps, his cheeks burning as saltwater tears drag themselves over his raw skin.

Magnus does what he does best and sweeps in, sitting down beside the boy and wrapping an arm around him. In no time at all Angus in curled up in his lap, Magnus’ shirt covered in damp patches from the boy’s sobbing as he cries himself empty. Once the boy is all cried out, Magnus says what he’s been thinking for a couple hours no

_I don’t think he means to, Angus. I think he doesn’t know how important those things are to you. Yeah, he’s an ass, let’s get that established, but if he really knew... I think he’d pull his punches._

“You really think so?” Angus curls up tighter, looking like he’s ten seconds from falling asleep.

_I know so. I’ll  promise I’ll talk to him in the morning._ Magnus isn’t sure the kid is awake long enough to hear him make that promise, but he knows for sure he’s keeping it. He tucks the boy into bed, running a hand over the intricate carvings in the wood and wondering if he would’ve done this for his own son if he ever had one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The formatting went to shit every time I tried to preview this so I had to rewrite it twice. Make that three times since the formatting went to shit when I published, too.


	12. Lucretia

As Magnus walks towards a garden he thinks holds no ill will for him, Lucretia stands in front of a door she thinks holds nothing but ill will for her.

Could she have avoided all this? If she’d made the right choice that night, would they have escaped? They’d all hate her, there was no doubt in her mind, but they’d be safe.

Is being hated better than being trapped in this reality forever? That was a question she’d be stuck grappling with for the rest of her life.

 

* * *

 

Before Magnus, Merle, and Taako were carted off to the infirmary, Lucretia asked for the Animus Bell.  Taako fumbled with his bag for several minutes, then dumped all its’ contents on the floor in a huff and yelled at her to “Grab the stupid thing yourself, I’m done fighting with it !”

“I’m sure Magnus or Merle could’ve helped, Taako.” The Director quipped, her back aching in protest as she grabbed the bell.  Her heart hammered in her chest when she wrapped her fingers around it, a sense of completeness washing over her.

Here it was, the final relic. All she needed to do was siphon the light out of it and this nightmare could finally be over. She could finally reveal everything to them and they could finally be a family again. If Lucretia was quick, she could save the world by morning and wake them all up with a beaming grin. (The thought alone made her head spin, she could _save the world_ as if it was a late night errand.)

“Now...” She took a deep breath to ease the tremble in her hands. “Shall  we?” Magnus elbowed Taako and held his arm out for him to take. Merle tried to do the same for Lucretia. “No... No, thank you.” She shook her head so Merle would get the message and followed the three. The entire walk she searched for the right time and place to peel away and race toward her office. A team of clerics swarmed the boys to lead them to the infirmary and she took her chance.  As she rushed to her office she couldn’t help but notice the supernatural stillness in the air and the lack of color in the grass.

_He’s here._

The thought made her blood turn to ice.  She hiked her robes up and ran faster as every joint in her body protested, the phrase running out of time repeating in her head over and over. She burst into the throne room and shouted at the few remaining guards to leave. As they all shuffled towards the door she felt impatience roiling in her veins. _They’re moving so slowly. They’re wasting so much time._

The second the final guard stepped through the door, she slammed it shut with magical force and rushed to the chamber the relics had been hiding in for so long.

“Please, please, please, please, please, please...” She yanked the relics out of their chamber and hastily set them down in a half circle, kneeling before them and willing the Light back into the staff that had never left her side in 12 years.

“We’re so close. We’re so close now I can taste it. A few more minutes and we’ll all be safe. We’ll all be free.”  She shivered as the fragmented Light flowed into her staff, the sense of completeness that washed over her before growing in size until Lucretia felt like she was fit to burst.

The last of the Light was sapped from the Animus Bell and her staff glowed so  intensely  she couldn’t look  directly  at it. It was as if the Light of Creation itself  was excited  to be whole and used again. Lucretia rose to her feet with a deep breath. A spell decades in the making danced between her fingers as she raised her staff. She started to cast it but just then, something inside her shattered into a thousand pieces.

The Bulwark Staff clattered to the floor, her trembling hands still hanging in the air. She  was frozen  in that pose god knows how long, her trance coming to an end when a short sob broke out of her.  A whine followed the sob, and she  slowly  lowered her hands, curling up in front of the relics as a wave of failure washes out all her previous feelings of completeness.

“I- I can’t do it.” She reached for the staff and cradled it like a wounded child. “I can’t do it. I’ve ruined everything. You and I both know how this will play out now, we’ve seen it a hundred times before. We're too weak to escape, we’ll die along with everyone in this world.” Hot bile roiled in her stomach as the confession spilled out of her.  A thousand thoughts she’d packed away were now clamoring for attention as she realized the gravity of the situation.

“We can’t escape. I’m the only one left and I can’t do this alone...” Tears spilled down her cheeks and onto the staff, turning to steam as they touched the oak. She looked down at it, turning it this way and that in her hands.

“You’re not going to help at all, are you?” She asked the Light.

“What good are you, anyway? I’ve seen what your ‘craveability’ can do. People starve themselves to death prostrating over you and kill each other to get to you. And for what? A little intelligence boost. Until we siphoned you into those nightmares of relics, at least. You...” Her grip on the staff tightened. “You’re nothing but pain, do you know that?! The day you landed on our home planet was the beginning of the end for us! All you brought us was a fancy ship to  endlessly  outrun The Hunger. That’s all you ever bring: pain and The Hunger! Everything is good until you come along! What’s stopping me from-?!”

The realization shot through her like a bullet. Her hold on the Light faltered. It slipped from her grasp and rolled across her lap and the floor, bumping into the now empty relics. What was stopping her? Certainly not her family, she made sure of that.

When the Light of Creation dropped into their world, it was the exact same as every single world they  witnessed  afterward. The Light of Creation comes, the Light dwells, The Hunger comes, the Light flees, rinse and repeat.

“If... If I send you away...” The words felt like boulders in her throat. “Would The Hunger keep chasing you and leave us alone? Is that- is that how it always was?  Where we interrupting an endless waltz when we used you to build the Starblaster and followed you beyond the bounds of our reality ?” It was a horrible idea. She could trap them here forever and let The Hunger chase and consume the rest of reality.

But he wouldn’t eat this one.

And that’s all that matters to Lucretia.

She lunged for The Bulwark Staff, keeping a vice grip on it as she shot to her feet.  Her entire body thrummed with resolve as she marched outside, the doors slamming open in front of her as she walked out into the still night.

She held the staff as if she was trying to strangle it, arms extended to get it as far from her as possible. The word seemed overeager to be spoken and flitted out of her throat with ease, dropping into the air like a stone.

“Go.”

Lucretia let go of the staff and it hovered in the air as if considering her command.  As she  slowly  withdrew her hands the staff shimmered, the body morphing its’ shape into something akin a slender dragonfly .  Tender, veiny wings peeled off the body and unfurled, fluttering as they stretched to full size.  Lucretia took a step back as the Light of Creation showed off its new form and zipped away into the colorless night sky.

The second the Light was out of her sight Lucretia collapsed to the ground, a sob tearing out of her as the weight of what she’d done hit her.

She had failed. She sacrificed 30 years of her life and the lives of so many other people and she has failed.

She had trapped them there. Without the Light of Creation, they won’t be able to flee this reality.

She had let a criminal go free.  They wanted to destroy The Hunger and free all existence of his tyranny, and she let him escape to spare one, single reality.

 

* * *

 

 

Lucretia had no idea how long she laid there, mourning a failure no one else in the world could understand no matter how much she wanted to tell them.

“Davenport?” The gnome put a small, warm hand on her back. She jolted at the touch and sat up, wiping her eyes. There was a soft breeze blowing. The grass had never looked greener.

“I’m- I’m fine, Davenport. It’s nothing-  just  some late night yoga.”

“Davenport...” The word  was laced  with equal parts concern and accusation. He took one look at her and realized her staff was missing, eyes widening. “Davenport?”

“I lost it, Davenport. I can’t find it and I can’t walk back to my quarters or my office without it. I-”

“Davenport.” Davenport held out his arm for Lucretia to take. She smiled at him and looped her arm with his, standing up  slowly  and following his lead to Fantasy Costco. She grabbed the first cane she saw with no regard to whether it was the proper height or not, but Davenport put it back immediately. After some measurements of the canes on display and of Lucretia herself, he found one of the proper height and presented it to her. When they went up to pay Davenport cut Lucretia off with a quick word and pulled out his own pocketbook.

It was a short trip to her quarters afterward.  He opened the door to her bedroom and hoped she got the message, refusing to go to his own bedroom until she put on a nightgown and crawled into bed.

She couldn’t sleep that night.

After hours of stewing in her own anxious thoughts, Lucretia threw back the covers and put on a robe, heading to her private office in hopes there would be something in there ease her tumultuous emotions.

It didn’t work. Everything in there only seemed to compound her guilt.  The desk salvaged from the Starblaster, the souvenirs from 100 years abroad, the drawings she’d been feeding to the baby voidfish, and the starving baby voidfish itself.

She couldn’t bare to look at the little thing too long. She pinned her gaze on the symbol that had kept Barry away for so long. For years, she was afraid he’d ruin her plan.  She had hoped that when she finally recruited him he’d  be trapped  in his human body and ignorant of the truth. She had had her chance over a year ago and ever since then, Barry had done his best to stop her from creating the shield, only for her to stop herself at the last second.

“Oh, what’s the use anymore?” Lucretia grabbed the symbol and deactivated it, tossing it in the trash.

 

* * *

 

The Director squares her shoulders and knocks on the door, a book on the basics of Braille tucked under her arm and the offer for the glass eye on her lips. “Taako? Merle? Can someone please open the door?


	13. And We're Arguing

Magnus stumbles through the front door at too-early-o’clock after his heart-to-heart with Angus, his neck and back sore from falling asleep in a child sized desk chair.

Taako is still on the couch where Magnus last saw him. He’s finally sat up and runs his fingers over humiliatingly basic Braille that Lucrecia left after she gave him his first lesson on the subject. Several plates of cold food on the coffee table and half-finished drinks on makeshift book coasters tell Magnus the elf hasn’t moved since the night before.

 _Hey._ Magnus stands behind the couch, waiting for Taako to acknowledge his presence. The wizard just turns his page, ghosting his fingers over the Braille equivalent of _Fantasy Dick and Jane._

 _Hello? Mornin’?_ Magnus knocks on the back frame of the couch.

“Hey,” Taako says dryly. “Where’ve you been? You didn’t do your morning ‘piss, breakfast, jog’ routine.”

_Shit happened. I had a chat with Angus and passed out in a desk chair._

Taako stiffens up when Magnus mentions Angus. “Oh? What’d the little rugrat say?”

_A lot. The kid’s a private person, so hearing him unload for once was pretty... heavy. He had a lot to say about you, Taako._

“Like what?”

_Like... He doesn’t have a lot of material things._

“Well fucking _duh_ , Mango. Kid came here with a suitcase and nothin’ else. Why’s that so important all of a sudden?”

 _Because the few things he’s got, he’s got a lot of stock in. I hate to sound accusing, Taako, but-_ _  
_

“But?” Taako snaps.

 _But,_ Magnus begins again.

“But you’re about to accuse me of something, so you might as well get it out in the open, Burnsides.”

_It’s not even an accusation, you actually did it! You stole everything that kid had to remember his Grandpa by!_

“It’s not like I knew when I did it, okay?! The brat doesn’t open his mouth unless he’s going on about that stupid book series or some stupid mystery he solved!“ Taako explodes, his arms flying out in a frustrated gesture.

_That doesn’t make it any better, Taako! You still hurt his feelings! Hell, you stole his heritage from him!_

“When have I _ever_ cared about other people’s feelings?! Hell, when have _you,_ Magnus?! _You_ stole from the Refuge and Goldcliff banks! _You_ cut off Merle’s arm! And _you_ killed-!”

Magnus reaches out and grabs the other man by the shirt, yanking him halfway off the couch and up to eye level. Taako couldn’t see and Magnus couldn’t yell, but the gesture was still highly intimidating.

_Shut up! Just shut up, Taako! You were right beside me throughout all that and you did even worse! Just admit for once in your life that you fucked up and fix it instead of laughing it off!_

There’s dead silence. Then the soft ‘thump’ of Taako dropping down onto the couch.

Magnus storms out, slamming the door behind him and ramming the ‘up’ button on the elevator. He hopes it was a good exit, because now he’s paying for it sorely.

Magnus slumps against the wall and slides down with a groan, his lungs aching for air and his head spinning as his empty stomach groaned. He can’t keep doing this. He’s getting to the point he can’t carry anything when he walks because of the weakness in his arms. He can’t think, he’s so damn hungry. He tries to carve and the color reminds him of oatmeal with brown sugar and walnuts or juicy chicken legs. He tries to sleep and he dreams of feasts and conversations he can’t have anymore. He tries to take a walk and he has to sit down every ten feet, and sometimes he can wind himself just by standing up.

As the elevator dings a terrifying thought crosses his mind: What’s going to land him in a coffin first, his stomach or his lungs?

Magnus spends the rest of the day in a place he’s rarely ever been: the library. It’s the only place he _can_ be now. No food, no need to move around, and all the privacy he needs.

It’s the single most boring day of his life.

His Stone is dead in his pocket, good for nothing but a paperweight now. All the large print books are far too long for Magnus to even hope to tackle in a day, and the few hobby books are geared towards knitting, sewing, weaving, or something else with a thread involved. It could’ve been a very, very boring day, if not for the arrival of one person.

“Magnus?” Angus steps up to him with a massive, black book under his arm. “You never come in here, what’re you doing?”

Magnus sighs as heavily as he can and shrugs, then pats the chair beside him. _I tried to talk to Taako. It didn’t shake out._

“Well, what happened?” Angus slides into the chair beside Magnus, setting his book aside.

_It went from ‘hey Taako you maybe messed up there’ to ‘arguing like petty teenagers’ to ‘well fuck you too’ in a hot minute._

“I thought that would happen. Taako’s not the best at heart-to-heart, and he hasn’t gotten better ever since... all this started. Thanks for sticking up for me anyway, Magnus. No one’s really done it before.”

_That’s the saddest shit I’ve heard all day._

“I’m reading something that’s even sadder. Do you want to read it with me?”

Magnus weighed the pros and cons for a second, measuring ‘being sad all day’ against ‘bonding with Angus over being sad all day’. While bonding with Angus would be nice, Magnus could do without the sadness attached.

_How about we find a pick-me-up story to read together? We can be miserable some other day._

 

* * *

 

Magnus doesn’t return to the suite until late into the night, the uplifting finale to the story still making his chest feel warm and light.

He expects to be dead asleep before his head hits the pillow. Magnus shrugs off his shirt and kicks off his shoes and he can already feel heavy, pleasant exhaustion on his eyelids. He flops onto the bed with a grunt, shifting into the perfect position before closing his eyes waiting for sweet sleep to wash over him, the sound of someone showering acting as white noise.

Midnight has come and gone and he still can’t sleep. He feels exhausted down to the marrow in his bones but every time he lays down and closes his eyes sleep is just out of reach. His mind races in the silence of his room, thoughts of failure, of death, of loneliness and of regret clawing at his mind until he snaps open his eyes and wills them all away with a deep breath. Then he has to try again. The second he can feel himself drifting away his perpetually empty stomach clenches on itself or a new joint aches in protest or pain blooms in his head from using a magical relic all day.

Magnus sighs and sits up, undoing the scant amount of progress he’d made and grabbing the BoPT. If he can’t sleep, he might as well try to do something useful with his time. Magnus heads out of his room, hugging the wall and rehearsing his lines as he heads towards Taako’s room.

 _Taako? I know our conversation didn’t shake out before-_  Magnus stops in his tracks.

Taako’s door is wide open, a beam of light spilling over the suite common room and highlighting a trail of puddles snaking out of it to an unknown destination.

 _Taako?_ Magnus follows what he realizes are damp imprints of Taako’s bare feet all the way out the suite and to the elevator.

 _Oh, shit._ He backtracks as fast as he can, following after the footprints all the way to Taako’s adjacent bathroom. The shower head is still spewing out water and the curtain has been torn down, funneling water onto the tile floor. Taako’s umbrella obediently waited on the towel rack, but the elf himself was nowhere to be found.

 _SHIT!_ Magnus runs out of the bathroom, nearly tripping over a dozen things as he barrels out of Taako’s bedroom, skidding to a stop in the hall and crashing into Merle’s door, He pounds on the door a dozen times in half a second before he remembers Merle can’t hear and mutters a curse to himself.

 _Merle! Merle get up! Oh fuck... MERLE!_ Magnus can already feel his lungs burn and his muscles turn to lead as the burst of adrenaline begins to wear off. He doesn’t have time, (does Taako have even less time?) he _has_ to get Merle up and moving before his own strength runs out. Magnus steps back and thinks of a quick apology, then rams his shoulder into the door and breaks it open. The force is enough for the knob to go through the wall and Merle wakes with a start as light from the hall streaks across his room.

“What the hell?!” He scrambles for his glasses, pulling them on just in time to see a panicking and panting Magnus barreling in.

_Sorry about the door. Taako’s missing. Check the bathroom._

“Magnus?! What in the world are you doing?!” Merle couldn’t hear Magnus’ wheezing anymore, but he could see every other sign he was flashing that _he was not alright._ Magnus could barely stay vertical and his lips were tinted blue, and his gaze was unfocused. “Slow the hell down and breathe! Let me heal you, you look all kinds of fucked up.” Merle climbed out of bed and grabbed Magnus’ arm, pulling him towards the bed and wrestling him into a sitting position.

 _No, there’s not enough time! Something’s wrong! He could be running out of time!_ Magnus clung to the other’s arm, pointing out the door and trying to shove him towards it.

“I could say the same about you! Now-!” Merle slapped his open wooden palm onto Magnus’ bare chest, knocking out what little wind remained in him. As Magnus inhaled a few things clicked for Merle.

One: He could feel the vibrations in the other’s chest and it was almost as good as hearing it.

Two: He could ‘hear’ some of the worst wheezing he’d ever saw in his life in his friend's chest.

Three: “Pan’s gonna fix this right up. Just innnhale slowly... and eeexhale...”

As they exhale in unison, tiny white flowers bloom on Merle’s arm to mark the path of Pan’s blessing. Magnus gasps like he’s been slapped again as the divine energy takes root in his skin and grows, tangling around his ribs and snaking through his lungs to burn away the illness that had plagued him.  

For the first time in days he takes a breath and he feels _full_ of air.The invisible hands that have squeezed his lungs finally let go as Merle pulls his own away, looking up at Magnus. “You wanna explain your shit lungs now or later?”

 _Later. Go get Taako._ Pan’s divine healing must’ve come with a side of sedatives, as Magnus flops backward onto the undersized bed and falls asleep immediately.

Merle huffs, turning Magnus enough that only half of him is hanging off the edges of the mattress. “Usually when half-naked guys pass out in my bed they’re a lot shorter.”

There’s a hundred other jokes he could make but he has no time. He’s already wasted time enough according to Magnus. Merle heads into the hall and spots the trail of water in seconds, muttering a swear, following it to the bathroom (shutting off the water) and out to the elevator.

“Well, _fuck_.” The elevators doors peel open and the Bureau grounds stretch out before him with nary a naked wizard in sight. There are footprints and water droplets on the cobblestone, but the tracks disappear as soon as the footprints veer into the grass.

“‘ _Well, fuck’_ again. I’m no ranger! I can’t do this!” Merle looks up, hoping Pan gets the message. “Not without help. at least. Got any freebies lying around, my ma- FUCK!” A moth flies right into Merle’s face, wings tickling his cheeks until he yells and jumps away. “OKay, okay, I’ll admit that was a dick move! But it’s cold, he’s wet, and my failed attempts at medical school tell me that’s an easy ticket to hypothermI-AHHH!” A firefly launches itself right at Merle, landing on his glasses then rocketing away. A second firefly flies toward him and then races in the same direction as the first. It finally clicks and Merle starts following them. “Thanks, Pan. Sorry about the misunderstanding.”

A third firefly joins the fray, then a fourth, then a fifth. The longer Merle follows the swarm across the quad the more it grows until the swarm is double his sizes and fireflies rest on his head and shoulders. “Taak-?! Wait, what’s the point? It’s not like I can hear him if he replies. You guys have my back, right?” Merle holds up his hand long enough for several bugs to flit onto his hand and fly off to rejoin their brethren in the task at hand. The swarm leads him to The Director’s office, resting on the damp door handle until he swats them away and opens the door.

In front of the dias are two people: Taako, unconscious and damp, with The Director’s night robe draped over him, and The Director herself in a nightgown, kneeling over him with a horrified expression. When she hears the doors open she snaps her head up and exclaims something. He runs over immediately, kneeling on the other side of Taako and pressing his fingers to the other’s neck, muttering ‘oh, thank god’ when he feels a pulse. He looks up to Lucretia and starts to speak, stopping himself mid-sentence and asking if she had her journal on hand. She shakes her head ‘no’.

“Fuck... uh... guess we gotta play unsexy 20 questions. Is this where you found Taako?”

She pauses, then nods.

“Do you have your Stone?”

She shakes her head.

“How long have you been here?”

She holds up three fingers.

“Three minutes?”

Nod.

“You can do the walk and talk stuff, are there any night shift clerics?”

She shakes her head.

“Where’s that gnomish fellow live? How fast can you get him and his crew here?”

Lucretia thinks, then holds up an outstretched hand. It takes Merle a couple of seconds to understand, then he nods. “I think he can survive five more minutes.”

Lucretia says something and nods, pulling herself to her feet with her cane and walking out as fast as she could.

Merle is left all alone with a chilly elf and nothing to do but kneel and heal (and check if Taako really had a mole shaped like a dick on his back (He did.)).

“Oh, heavenly Pan, through the power in me, bring warmth to this downtrodden- You never were one for dressing up words. Places, people, and things, yeah, but not words. My friend’s fucked up -the other one- can ya help me out here?”

Merle feels his hands begin to radiate warmth and presses them against Taako’s side, looking up and saying a quick ‘thanks’ to his god.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the hiatus between this chapter in the last one, I don't really have an excuse. I got writers block and then my computer went and prepares went in for repairs. I've had to borrow computers to write this chapter but I think it's been worth it. I promise I'll have the next chapter up within a week!


	14. Christ and Ichor

“First Magnus, then your twink ass. I dunno what I’m gonna do with you two.” Merle looks toward the door for the third time in two minutes, wondering when Lucretia would arrive with help. “He’s got cobwebs in his lungs and you've got... this. If it wasn’t for me, one at least one of you would be worm food by now, despite what you think.” It was selfish to say that, but Taako was too unconscious to hear him and Merle figured he deserved a selfish moment.

“I’m not one to say ‘no’ to a good, old-fashioned spirit quest, but you could’ve picked a better time to start. Sure, you still could’ve been as naked as a jaybird, but I’d change a few other things. Maybe start during the day, maybe try a place that’s not so cold it turns your nuts into peas, and- oh yeah, bring some damn supplies.” Merle keeps his hands on Taako, warming his trunk as evenly as possible.

“I guess that would be hypocritical of me. I didn’t have anything on hand when I ran off that one night, but I didn’t have to call a cleric afterward, so I consider that a win.”

 

* * *

 

3:59 AM. Merle had spent almost five hours sitting in bed with the warmth of the crappy take out they ate with Lucretia ebbing away in his guts and absolutely nothing to do. To his right, Magnus is still as a stone. To his left (when he turns his head far enough to see him) Taako is tossing and turning between bouts of drooling in some new spine breaking position.

Magnus walks through his field of vision. Merle watches the other for a few seconds then sighs, throwing back the blankets and putting his feet on the floor. Should he say something? Would it even matter? More importantly, what is Magnus doing? Even _more_ importantly, does he care?

He heads for the exit as Magnus starts doing... whatever he’s doing. On his way there, Merle swipes a clipboard to jam the door open; the last thing he needed was to get locked out with half his ass peeking out the back of his hospital gown. (It didn’t even frame his Kenny Chesney tattoo properly.)

He takes the deepest breath he can once he’s outside, the cold, recycled air of the moon base feeling like a godsend after spending all day in an infirmary reeking of hand sanitizer and cough medicine. Merle once read the sadder you feel, the less color your eyes process. He laughed it off back then, but now he was starting to wonder. The grass looks more grey than green in the moonlight, and the breeze usually stirred by dozens of moving bodies in the daytime is now absent. Merle sighs, finding a bench to sit on and staring out over the quad.

“What the hell am I gonna do, Pan?” He only tacks on the name out of habit. Pan clearly didn’t care about him after today, why else would he cut off Merle like that? Was Merle not devoted enough? Had Merle made too much of a fool of himself and Pan was aching for an excuse to get rid of him? Did Pan know what would happen in Wonderland? Did Pan not want a one-eyed, deaf cleric like him?

That last thought hits Merle like a punch in the gut. He could live with being stuck on the sidelines of every conversation for the rest of his life. (Hell, he already did.) He could live with people treating him like he was stupid or saying they couldn’t make the simplest accommodations, or miss out on beautiful sounds like violins, singing voices, and the first cries of grandchildren.

But Pan? Merle shudders at the thought of living without him. Pan defined Merle’s life from end to end without ever being there in the flesh. Merle had been born in the temple, raised in the temple, and was going to be buried in the temple of Pan.

He didn’t even get to give up on the man. Pan just threw him out like yesterday’s trash. Merle takes a deep breath and feels a lump in his throat the size of a baseball. He knows what’s coming and relaxes, letting a sob come out. Another sob joins the first, followed by another. More and more sobs come out until he’s a mess of snot and tears, curled up and alone on a bench in the middle of nowhere.

“I’m sorry. Pan,” Merle cries, bowing his head. “I’m sorry I walked out on Hecuba and the kids. I’m sorry I walked out on the commune. I’m sorry I didn’t work hard. I’m sorry I embarrassed you. I’m so, so sorry I didn’t do good by you.  What do I gotta do to make it up to you?”

Merle looks to the sky through a tear streaked lense, expecting nothing but a cosmic cold shoulder. What he sees instead is a radiant dragonfly made of light shooting into the sky, rising higher and higher until it was a speck in a starless sky. Merle wonders if it's the spirit of nature running away from him.

“Please don’t leave me... please... I need you, you pantless bastard!” Merle sniffles and pulls his glasses off, wiping his nose on his hospital gown as he feels a weight settle on the other end of the bench. “What the hell do you want?”

_You summoned me, I think it’s more about what you want._

Merle’s never heard that voice before, much less heard it emanating from inside his head, but it already sounds like an old friend. He whips his head to the right and sees a smiling, chubby-cheeked man with a bushy beard and wild hair and the warmest, most inviting eyes he’s ever seen. The man doesn’t open his mouth yet Merle hears his voice loud and clear.

 _Hey, Merle._ Pan reaches out to pat Merle’s shoulder.

“Holy-” Merle’s jaw drops and he jerks back, looking the man up and down to take in every detail. “Holy...” He reaches out slowly to touch the man’s shoulder, unsure if it was really Pan himself in the flesh.

Pan chuckles, telling Merle to ‘ _Take your time’_ and smiling at his dumbfounded look.

“Holy shit, you’re real.” He finally rests his hand on Pan’s shoulder and feels warm flesh toughed up by a lifetime of labor and wrapped in a layer of soft fat from dozens of good meals.

_As real as this bench, Merle; and I’m here for you now._

“I... I’ve worshipped you my entire life and- I’ve never known what to feel about you. God I- It’s been one hell of a ride.” Merle feels like he’s been punched, in a good way.

_I know, Merle. I’m no mind reader like some of my pals in the Celestial plane, but I’ve been watching the entire time._

“Then why’d you hang up on me? I needed you today more than ever and you left me!”

 _Merle-_ Pan shifts to face Merle completely, then takes his wooden hand and wraps his own two around it. _I knew you needed me today, and I wanted to be there every step of the way, but there was this black... black bile in the plane that cut us off. We were all mortified to be separated from our patrons, but no one was more upset than me. You needed me and I wasn’t there! If you hate me, I understand. I tell mountains to rise and fall, I tell every tree how to grow, and I summon the rain and the sun every single day, but the one day one person needed me I couldn’t do a thing. That kind of powerlessness ate at my soul, Merle. I rushed here the second that blackness went away so I could apologize! I’m so sorry I wasn’t there for you, will you ever forgive me?_

Merle looks down at Pan’s hands wrapped around his own, then back up at Pan, eyes wide and jaw hanging open. He blinks a few times and exhales, reaching up to wipe his eye. “I thought you left me. I thought you kicked me out and hated _me.”_

 _Why in the world would I hate_ you, _of all people?_

“I...” He sighs and looks down, squeezing Pan’s hand. “I thought you wanted to get rid of me because I’m deaf now.”

 _Merle..._ Pan squeezes his hand back before letting go to put his hands on Merle’s shoulders. _I would_ never  _turn my back on an acolyte. I’m not a finicky god who tosses away people or holds them to a standard, I just ask you to worship me and let me be your god. And you...Merle, you’re one of my most devoted worshipers._

“Come on, that can’t be true. There’s plenty of- of people living in temples and dedicating their lives to planting trees or some shit.”

 _I certainly don’t complain about those devotees, but they’re not like you, Merle. I’ve had acolytes go through a fraction of what you’ve experienced and turn their back on me. You’ve struggled with your faith for a lifetime and came out even more steadfast in your devotion. There are_ so many people _who know my name because of you.  I... I don’t know I can repay you._

“Well, I’ve got an idea...” There’s a long pause as Merle waits for Pan to catch his drift.

“I’m deaf, my man, can you fix that?”

 _Oh!_ Pan sits up straighter, blinking rapidly. _I was thinking of something else entirely._

“Like what?”

_Something you can’t do on a park bench at your age._

Merle lets out a peal of laughter, throwing his head back and smiling for the first time in what felt like years. “Hahahahahahah! Ah... I’ll think about it. I was serious about the hearing, though.”

Pan’s smile goes from bright and cheery, to nervous, to falling right off his face in the span of seconds.

“Oh...” Merle can tell what’s wrong instantly, and feels his heart drop into his guts again; hot, heavy despair radiating from the new hole in his chest.

_The thing about nature is that it's... beautiful and powerful and... imperfect. It’s got its limits and I’ve got mine. Sometimes I don’t get things right, how could I possibly do it perfectly every time? There’s so many daisies, so many mice, and so many people. Flowers grow the wrong colors, wolves are born deformed, sometimes it doesn’t survive in that environment. Other times it does, but maybe not how everyone else does. Red flowers in yellow fields are worshiped, albino snakes are prized-_

“Are you calling me a _trophy_?” Merle pulls his hand out of Pan’s embrace, glaring daggers at him.

 _No! Me, no! That’s not- oh shit, that all came out wrong..._ Pan sighs. _What I want to say is: You’re not the first disabled acolyte I’ve and you’re not going to be the last. You might be a little different from everyone else, but you’re not worth any less. You just have to do things a bit differently or do the same stuff with different tools- like your wooden arm. Plenty of people have walked up to me, pissed as hell they came out with fused fingers or a different kind of mind and they wonder if I did it to punish them. And I always say: ‘No. I’m sorry for what other people put you through. I wish they could see the beauty in no two things being the same but they can’t. People will praise how varied I can make a patch of roses but not a patch of people. It’s not right, but that’s one weed I can’t root out, everyone’s got to tend to it themselves. Come here, sit down, and maybe farty old Pan here can help you somehow.’_

“How do you do it? How do you help them?”

_What’s on your right shoulder?_

“Oh. What about the not-a-missing-limb stuff? Things like me and my boys and bad head stuff?”

_That’s a lot harder. Some things... came out wrong and I can’t repair them. Their natural state is... their natural state and I can’t futz with nature like that. I can add on things or subtract but I can’t change what they are. I help people learn new ways to do things or point them towards who can teach them, but there’s a fundamental level I can’t change people on._

“Stupid _gods_ , why can’t you all be omnipotent?” Merle smirks, nudging Pan with his elbow.

 _I don’t know, Merle. It'd make shit a whole lot easier._ Pan nudges Merle back then pauses, looking away and concentrating on something.

 _I want to give you a gift. It might not make sense now, but I know you’ve got the stuff to make it work._ Pan reaches behind him and pulls out a package wrapped in paper and a morning glory vine. Merle takes the package and tears off the paper to find a pan flute with notes written on the appropriate pipes and sheet music.

“You’re a real ass, did you know that?”

_It was last second, but... Maybe it can teach you something. The usual way isn’t the only way to do something._

“This is probably highly spiritual and could teach a good lesson and all, but right I just think this is a dick move.”

_Maybe it’s a highly spiritual dick move. You don’t have to use it the way people usually do. You do you, no matter what ‘you’ might be._

“There are simpler ways to say ‘I have no idea, I’m making this up as I go’, Pan.”

That gets a good chuckle out of Pan. _Alright, I have an idea, but I’m making it up as I go along. Maybe you’ll learn to play just by reading notes. Maybe you’ll sell it and buy something amazing. It’s not up to me anymore, it’s your gift, use it as you please._

Merle and Pan say their goodbyes after that. Merle feels reinvigorated as he walks back to the infirmary, a feeling that’s quickly quelled when he walks in to see Magnus and Taako brawling on the floor.

“Pan tap dancing on a pin, I was only gone for 20 minutes!”

 

* * *

 

“Merle!” Lucretia shouts as she rushes in ahead of the team of clerics she’d woken up, her hips, knees, and ankles screaming from the effort. “Merle-!” She missteps and trips, flying through the air and crashing into his field of vision.

Dr. Weaver shouts her name and runs over, fingertips glowing as they cast a healing spell. “I don’t think you should be running with your deteriorating joints, Madame Director.” They take The Director’s arm, helping her to her feet and holding out her cane for her to take.

“They’re already deteriorating, why shouldn’t I use them while I still have them?” Lucretia takes her cane back and thanks the head cleric as the two begin to have the same argument they’ve had a hundred times before.

The other clerics rush in around them, wheeling in a stretcher and throwing around questions and commands as they reach the elf. Merle backs up just in time to avoid getting trampled by a team working in perfect sync to get Taako on the stretcher. They move to wheel him out and Merle grabs the stretch in a vice grip. “I’m going with him.” The team share looks with each other and say things he can’t hear, trying to pull the stretcher away.

“He’s my friend. I sat here and saved his life long before any of _you_ showed up. I’m going with him.” Merle narrows his eye and speaks in a sterner tone. The team concedes, moving so he can stand at Taako’s side while they wheel him into the infirmary.

Lucretia and Dr. Weaver continue their health related bickering for some time, eventually culminating in both of them ordering the other to go get some sleep.

She fumes the entire march back to her quarters, muttering to herself that Dr. Weaver was always yammering about trying to ‘preserve’ her health when Lucretia already knew she would outlive her health. Her duty is done, the light is gone. There’s nothing left for her to do, she might as well run and jump and dance around while she still can.

The door is ajar when Lucretia finally reaches it, but she thinks nothing of it, assuming she didn’t shut it properly when the alarm in her private office rung. She hopes that in her rush she didn’t wake-

“Davenport?!” The gnome is on his hands and knees in the kitchen, tea and ichor dripping off the dining table to join the vomit and broken crockery on the floor. He looks up at Lucretia with wide, frightened eyes and tears his dirtied hand away from his mouth.

“Lucretia, what have you done?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter was late! My computer finally came in but this was a very difficult chapter to nail, especially when it came to Pan's monologues! I still feel like I missed the mark, and if anyone can offer critique don't be afraid to comment! Next personal deadline is September 10th. A special notice, I will be MOVING on September 16th, barring any unexpected delays or advances, so that may delay the release of chapter 16, depending on how much work needs to be done.


	15. Captain Davenport

“Lu- huff! huff! -Lucretia!” Davenport leans on the breakfast table, clutching his chest as he gives her a wild, wide-eyed stare that. “What... what have you done?”

“I- I....” She takes a step back, wrapping both hands around her cane in an imitation of the way she used to cling to her staff. Davenport can see the hardened outer shell of Madame Director crumbling on the spot, Cadet Lucretia Notaro revealing herself for the first time in over 100 years. She’s even wearing the same heartbroken expression he remembers from their very first meeting in an IPRE hallway. (She’d failed her physical exam by a hair’s breath and thought her career was over before it begun. Davenport sat down beside her and they talked for some time. Six months later, she was grinning ear to ear as he gave a speech to the new recruits.)

“What would Admiral Sardusky call this?” He takes a deep breath and stands with a dignity he hadn’t summoned in millennia, a thousand lessons on manner and decorum rushing back to him.  “She’d call it _mutiny, Cadet._ ”  

“I-I-I- I... Um- uh- I... I- I...” Lucretia stammers so severely she can’t get a single word out. The irony isn’t lost on Davenport.

“I wouldn’t call it mutiny, myself. Mutiny is a simple rebellion against authority, but you betrayed your  _family_ , Lucretia.” He slides his hand off the breakfast table, turning towards her fractions of an inch.

“You should sit. You’re going to hurt your joints standing this long,” Davenport says. Lucretia sinks onto the couch without a word, eyes wide and glued to him as if he would attack at any moment. He holds out both hands as he takes a step back, skirting around spilled tea, ichor, and vomit and grabbing the (now broken) teapot off the floor. He brews the new batch of tea as slowly as he can, choreographing each movement to his own deep breaths.

Breath in, open the teapot. Breath out, fill the teapot. Breath in, close the teapot. Breath out, grab a stool and move the teapot to the stovetop. Breath out, turn the knob, watch the flames leap from the burner. Breath in. Wait.

Davenport stares at the teapot. The spout has been broken off and a crack yawns open on the side, tearing a watercolor rose in half and allowing steam to escape. He looks over the kitchen counter and into the living room, making eye contact with Lucretia for a split second before they both look away. Lucretia bows her head and stares at her hands. Davenport raises his own and traces the lines in the wood grain of the cupboards.

“I’m sorry,” she says.

Davenport bites back the retort of ' _you should be’_ ' that sits on his tongue. It’s petty and immature, and no second of catharsis is worth the strain or tension. That, and habits built up over ten years of being her caretaker don’t break in one day. He opens the cupboards, looking over dozens of jars of loose leaf tea. “Black or green?”

“You can pick.”

Davenport takes a deep breath, disappointment showing in the slope of his shoulders before he nods and picks a white rose tea. Breath in. Bring out cups. Breath out. Bring infusers out. Breath in. Wait.

They don’t try to look at each other this time.

When the tea is finally brewed Davenport brings both cups out to the couch, handing Lucretia hers before sinking onto the seat beside her.

“I don’t know where to start...” Davenport says.

“I’m sorry,” Lucretia replies.

“I know you are. You haven’t looked happy ever since the day Magnus, Merle, and Taako came back. You- what did you do, Lucretia? What happened that day?”

“I- ugh, so much happened I don’t know where to start.” She sets her cup on the coffee table and rubs her temples. Davenport coughs and she puts the cup on a coaster.

“Alright. I’ll narrow it down. Why didn’t you have your staff? Did you walk anywhere without it? How far? You know Weaver’s going to find out at your next-”

“At my next check-up, I know. Does it even matter anymore? Davenport-”

Davenport grimaces at the sound of his own name on Lucretia’s lips. It felt far too intimate after everything he’d realized, his family of 100 years and his family in the IPRE before that called him ‘Davenport’. He didn’t give himself petty retorts and wrathful screams and speeches, but he’d give himself this. “Captain. It’s ‘Captain’, Cadet Notaro.”

Lucretia looks like she’s been smacked. It felt like he’d reached over and ripped out her heartstrings. Over 100 years of friendship had been wiped away with one word she never expected to hear again. “U-Understood... Captain.”

“Glad to see you do. Now, can you tell me what happened that night?”

“The Hunger was right on our heels. I didn’t have time to think of a new plan, all I could do was execute my own. I- I had the Light of Creation in my staff and I was ready to cast it- then something inside me broke. I realized how bad of an idea it was, and I realized how _everything_ that’s happened to those three is my fault. I... I was so stupid and I had blinders on. I forgot how cruel Wonderland could be and because of my incompetence, their lives were changed forever. I doubted myself in that moment. Maybe it was a good thing. I didn’t- I didn’t bubble our plane and cut off its bonds but... I’m not sure if what I did was better.”

“What did you do?”

“I- This is going to sound unbelievable, but- I got angry. I got angry at the Light for coming to our world and attracting the Hunger. I got angry at it for making us chase it for 100 years and never helping or explaining itself. I blamed the Light for everything the Hunger did. I blamed it for making me sit on the deck of a departing ship and helplessly watch as everyone I’d ever known died. I blamed the light for the nights when I wondered what my mother would say or when I fell asleep and saw dozens of faces there were dead and gone forever. I... I yelled and sobbed and poured my heart out into blaming the Light and then I told it to go.”

“Go?”

“I sent the Light away. Without us. The Hunger took off to chase it and- I’m so sorry, Davenport. I failed us all. I trapped us here. I let The Hunger go free.” Lucretia hugs herself as she ends her tearful confession.

Davenport, for the second time that night, feels his world change completely. An unpleasant constant that had hung over his head for one hundred years was unceremoniously shipped away while he wasn’t looking. The thing that ate everyone he’d ever known and left him to suffer a lifetime of ‘what if’s and ‘i miss’es was... gone. It didn’t even feel like a victory. It felt hollow and cheap and he felt duped. The Hunger wasn’t even defeated! Davenport didn’t get to participate in the ousting of the great evil that defined their lives for 100 years... he just got to see the effects. It perfectly mirrored his life for the past ten years: able to see, but unable to participate.

“Boy, uh... you really fucked up, Notaro.”

Lucretia doubles over and bursts into laughter, tears in her smile lines. Davenport joins with his own restrained chuckle, leaning back to watch her clutch her stomach and throw her head back. “I’m- Ha ha ha! I’m sorry, Captain that was just so out of the blue! Heh heh heh!”

“Heh, I guess it was pretty funny.” He tries to smile a little longer, his lips getting heavier and heavier until the cheer slides right off his face. “But... I need to know _why_ you did it.”

“That’s a very long story, Daven- Captain, and it’s very late.”

“Okay. So tell me in the morning. But I’m not letting you go until you hear this: You really messed up. That’s clear as day. Here’s the rub, though: you messed up _alone._ You didn’t let us help you the first time. And that’s not going to fly anymore, Cadet. I’m giving you a direct order-” Davenport points at Lucretia.” Let me know what’s going on. Let me help you this time.”

“Help with what, Captain? The Light’s gone, we’re stuck, there’s nothing left.”

“Oh, there is _plenty_ left to clean up, Cadet. Like Barry, who’s probably still on the base. There’s Lup, who we _will_ find if it kills us. And...”

“And?” Lucretia gives him an apprehensive look that says she knows exactly what’s coming.

“I want you to set a date to sit down with Mangus, Merle and Taako. I want you to tell them everything. And I want you to start training them again. We're turning the tables and going after The Hunger as soon as we can. ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> JUST under the deadline! I've already begun packing for my move and thus can't give an ETA on chapter 16, but it's already shaping up to be a doozy. If you feel any improvements could be made, don't be afraid to comment.


	16. Barry

Davenport wakes up slowly, gasping and reeling when he realizes he’s not in his cramped quarters on the Starblaster.

“Oh... ” He sighs, picking himself up off the floor and taking a good, long look at what had been his room for a year now. The gnome reaches out to open a dresser drawer and he’s shaken by how solid and heavy it feels all of a sudden. He’d gone from watching himself from ten feet away through a blissful fog for ten years to being _himself_ again in less than a minute, and it still hadn’t hit. Davenport still felt like he should be in that fog, waking up at 4 am from training in an academy he couldn’t remember and caring for a woman whose name he knew but could never say.

He showers with products he helped pick through a fog, dresses in clothes he didn’t pick at all, and walks into a kitchen that he can barely recognize despite living there for a year. He opens a cupboard expecting to see plates, cups, and bowls in, only to come face to face with tins of rice and noodles.

“Did I ever actually live here?” He knows he’s physically been there for a year, but mentally it felt like he’d walked into a stranger’s home after a decade in the jungle.

Davenport does something he has done dozens of times: he sets his mind to a task and he contemplates.

He told Lucretia they needed to set things right and to do the impossible. If he broke it down, it wouldn’t be as impossible.

First, to do the impossible, he had to get his family back together and in fighting form. Taako, Merle, and Magnus were accounted for, but they’re far from ready to go head to head with any opponent.

At least he knew _where_ they were, which he couldn’t say for Lup and Barry- well, just Lup. He’d overheard just enough from Lucretia and the boys to determine Barry had been stalking them planetside.

(Of course, he was still in that stupid red robe. Davenport _begged_ them both not to do it, _ordered_ them when it was clear his pleading as a family member wouldn’t work, so he commanded them as their captain. It still didn’t work, but now he thinks it was a good thing.)

Davenport knew he’d need to ask Lucretia for help, it would be hypocritical of him not to after everything he said. A not-so-insignificant him wanted to lie to and hide from her, however. Asking for help felt like showing weakness, or worse, opening up to her, and he couldn’t let himself do that. She’d dashed their friendship to pieces and he felt like he had to go back to the stern, unflappable, and unfamiliar man he was back at the IPRE. It felt better to pretend they were strangers again, back on a world where they had superiors to report to and coworkers and back when the world felt _right_.

Roughly an hour later Lucretia shuffles out of her room, still in her pajamas and going through the final motions of her morning stretches. She sits down and they look at each other, afraid to be the first to speak. What could they say that wouldn’t make the situation worse?

“Have you taken your medication today?” He asks, not looking up from the frying pan.

“Yes,” She replies.

He mumbles a reply and they lapse back into silence. Lucretia pours herself a cup of tea and sips it slowly, looking everywhere but where Davenport’s standing until her gaze lands on the clock. “Angus will be here soon, what will we do? What do we tell him?”

“The truth,” Davenport says flatly. “We can’t lie to anyone anymore. Lying got us into this mess, and it’s crystal clear we can’t lie our way out. Only the truth is going to fix this, as difficult as it’s going to be.”

Lucretia winces as the implications settle in the air, the tension cranking up another notch. “He’s not inoculated, he won’t understand anything we say.”

“Whoever inoculated me covered their bases.” Davenport holds up a vial of ichor that had been hidden in one of the tea containers. “In case I threw out the poisoned pot, he- they left this behind. I don’t know why they thought I would decide to drink a mystery substance I found out of the blue. I was amnesiac, not stupid.” He sets down the vial.

“Permission to speak freely, Captain?”

“Permission granted.”

“You don’t have to pretend you don’t know who did this. Taako, Merle, and Magnus are still out of the loop, Lup’s still missing, and Barry’s... well, he’s the last possible choice.”

“I was attempting to be impartial, Cadet. We have nothing but theories and I’m not calling anything confirmed until it is _confirmed_.”

“There’s being impartial then there’s being plain stup-”

“Permission to speak freely suspended, Cadet Notaro.”

Lucretia clamps her lips shut and glares at the back of his head before directing her gaze to her cup of tea.

Davenport finishes cooking breakfast and sets the table, the tension rising as the sizzle of bacon and the tap of a spatula against the pan faded away, forcing them to simmer in the silence. Lucretia doesn’t rise to help and they both hold their breath as he leans close to set a plate and cutlery in front of her. When everything is ready, Davenport sits across from her, and they both silently pray for Angus to arrive and distract them.

 

* * *

 

 

Angus stumbles through the door at seven AM, one hour later. (To the pair at the table it felt like it’d been a dozen lifetimes.)

“Murnin’....” He groans, instantly catching on to the tension in the room. There’s something wrong with Davenport, his posture has lost its’ looseness and his eyes dart from place to place, nothing like the open, inviting gaze he had yesterday. The food is untouched and getting cold fast, and Davenport and Lucretia prefer to fidget and look at the floor or ceiling rather than look at the table and risk seeing each other in their peripheral vision.

“Good morning, Angus,” Lucretia says, short and clipped. Davenport says nothing.

“What’s-” Angus has a feeling they’re relying on him to defuse the tension, and tries to play the part. “-for breakfast? I thought I smelled bacon.” Agnus slides into his seat and loads his plate without a word, breaking the tension just enough for the other two to follow. As they all begin to eat, Davenport waits for the proper moment to make his reveal.

“Can you keep a secret, Angus?” Davenport blurts out when the boy’s plate is half eaten.

Angus nearly chokes on a sausage, smacking himself in the chest and looking at Davenport with wide eyes and a dribble of saliva still connecting his lips and the spat up food. “Uh.... m-ma’am?” He turns toward Lucretia, mouth still hanging open.

Lucretia looks at him for a second, then bows her head and goes back to eating.

“Ma’am?! Please talk to me! Why is- Has Davenport been lying to us this whole time?! Did he hit his head really hard?! Did he find a way to get a curse lifted?! What the fuck’s going on, Ma’am?!”

“It’s a simple yes or no question, Master McDonald.” Davenport pipes up, his intense stare now locked onto Angus.

“Uh- Yes! Yes, I can keep a secret now tell me what the secret _is!”_

 _“_ Okay, I’m Tulen Davenport, Captain of the Starblaster, a ship built by the IPRE - or the Institute of Planer Research and Exploration - in another reality over one hundred and twelve years ago. Lucretia wiped my memory and I just got it back. We need you to help us find Barry Bluejeans and Lup, inoculate our old friends, and train them to fight a cosmic entity called ‘The Hunger’.”

“Sir, I didn’t hear any of that. I heard-” Angus’ gaze flickers from Davenport to Lucretia, and back to Davenport as it clicks.“That’s another secret, isn’t it? There’s another voidfish? Where is it? When- Do I have to drink its’.... stuff, too?”

“There’s no point in letting you in on a secret you can’t hear.” Davenport holds up the spare vial of ichor and sets it down on Angus’ plate.

Angus picks up the vial gingerly, holding it up to the light and turning it this way and that before uncorking it. He takes a breath, steeling himself like a boy preparing to have his first drink before throwing his head back and drinking vile concoction, shuddering and grimacing as it slid down his throat.

“Are you alright, dear?” Lucretia asks.

“‘M- I’m fine. It just tastes _horrible_.”

“I can tell. How do you feel?”

Angus pauses, trying to focus and determine if anything felt off. “I feel a bit nauseous? I’ve felt worse before, though.”

“Good,” Davenport begins. “Now listen closely.”

 Angus scrambles to pull out a notebook and pen (Davenport’s heart ached at the sight of the thing. He and Lucretia spent hours together picking it out.) and looks up at Davenport with wide eyes.

“Are you ready?”

“Yes.” Angus nods eagerly, hand ready to shot across the page in his spidery, loose nightmare of handwriting.

“Good, because it’s a lot to take in.” Davenport pauses, taking a drink to prepare. “Lucretia, Magnus, Merle, Takko and I, along with two people you’ve never met named Barry Bluejeans and Lup, who is Taako’s twin sister, aren’t from this reality.” He watches Angus write in a frenzy and gives the boy time for the information to sink in. (He looks  like his head is about to explode.) We came from another reality that was a lot more advanced. We came on a spaceship called ‘The Starblaster’, which was built with the Light of Creation. There’s a lot more to explain but I want to cut to the chase, we need your help finding Barry and Lup. Can you help us, Angus?”

“Of course I can! I need-” Angus flips to a new page of his notebook. “I need a profile on Berny-”

“It’s ‘Barry’, Angus,” Lucretia interjects.

“I need a profile on _Barry._  What’s he like? What has he been doing recently? What’re his goals?” Angus flips to a new page of his notebook.

“He was our Head Science Officer on the Starblaster, and he was very mild. Very timid, took forever to come out of his shell at first. Of course, then he went and turned himself into a lich against direct orders. I still can’t believe he grew the balls to do that... I blame Lup.”  
“What did he do with Lup?”

“Lup was his girlfriend for- God, 50 years?” Lucretia turns to Davenport.

“53 years, though they were making eyes at each other during _training._ ”

“He would want to find Lup, then. What’s she like? Where did you last see her-?” Angus gasps, eyes wide as he slams his hands on the table. “How do you spell Lup?!”

“L-u-p?” Davenport says with a confused expression. “Why do you-?” Angus leaps out of his seat, knocking it to the floor as he rockets towards the door.

“Angus!” Both of the adults shoot to their feet and Davenport takes off after him.

“I know where Lup is!” Agnus skids to a stop in front of the elevator, pounding the ground floor button over and over as Lucretia stiffly walks out of the apartment, clinging to the door and her cane.

“Angus, where you going?!”

“I’m sorry, Madame! I’ll have to explain later! Meet us at the suite! You which one!” Angus yells as the elevator doors crawl open and he rushes inside, Davenport close at his heels.

“The damn elevator takes forever to close, just tell me now!” She starts walking towards them as the doors crawl closed.

“I think I know what Lup is!”

“‘ _What_ ’? You think you know _‘what’_ Lup is? Angus, that doesn’t make any sense-!” The doors clamp shut before they hear the rest of what she says.

After a few seconds of silence, Davenport speaks. “You saw it too, didn’t you?”

“Saw what?”

“How she was walking.”

“Um... yeah. It’s early in the morning, she might be a little sore.”

“She’s not just ‘sore’, Angus.”

“What do you mean?”

“Have you ever noticed there are no stairs on the base?”

“What are you trying to-?” The elevator dings and Angus rushes out, yelling at Davenport to follow him as he tore across the compound and toward the entrance to the Tres Horny Boy’s suite. He runs so fast he ends up smashing into the elevators doors, backing up and banging on the buttons with his glasses askew and a greasy imprint of his face on the doors.

The second the elevator begins to open the throws himself at it again, squirming through the slowly widening crack and muttering to himself as he tried to will the thing down. The boy’s so focused on the button panel he nearly forgets Davenport, and the gnome rushes through the closing doors in the nick of time.

“Been - Huff huff! - A few years - Huff! - Since I ran like that, kiddo...”

“Sorry, sir! However, I think you’ll agree it’s worth it!” Angus kept on ramming the button even as the elevator began to crawl down, tapping his foot and bouncing in place.

“How do you know where Lup is, Angus?”

“The- the- the umbrella! The umbrella spelled her name!”

“Umbrella? What umbrella? Do you mean _Taako’s_ umbrella?!” 

“Yes! Taako’s umbrella is-” The elevator dings and Angus launches himself at the doors before they’ve begun to open. “Come on!”

“Slow down, Angus, you’re gonna hurt yourself!” Davenport watches the boy squirm through the widening opening and races down the hall, throwing the front door open and freezing in his tracks.

“Angus?!” Davenport runs over as soon as the doors open enough. “Angus, what’s wr-?!”

His heart drops into his guts when he sees his old friend, Barry, standing in the middle of the common room, gingerly cradling Taako’s umbrella in his spectral grasp. His skeletal expression is unreadable, but his body language screams of surprise and embarrassment. “Barr-!”

There’s a crunch, and the world turns into nothing but light and heat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're back in business, baby! I'm still settling in at my new place, but I'm 99% there. And the plot is only going to get more buckwild from here.


	17. Fire, Fire, Fire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wish I'd written this chapter so much faster, but I think you'll all agree it's worth the wait.

“So,” Merle slams his ASL book shut.  “Why are you two in the principal's office today?”

Looking to his left, he sees Taako sitting up and fuming in his hospital bed, the wool blankets he’d been wrapped in now decorating the floor. To his right,  Magnus is still snoozing away with the help of divine sedatives.

“It’s not a principal’s office, you plant fu- fuck me, why did I forget again?” Taako rolls his cloudy eyes and tries to glare at Merle, missing the mark by several feet. “It was _so_ much more fun to sarcastically reply when you actually heard it.” He crosses his arms and flops backward onto the bed, landing on the paper-thin pillow with a grunt.

“You know, maybe you can swipe Magnus’ headband back and we can actually talk.” Merle looks towards Taako and taps his temple, only to remember the gesture would be lost on the other. “Fuck... you’d think about five days of this I’d have it down pat.”

Taako snorts and rolls over to face Merle. “ _Not even five whole days_ of losing everything that was important to you. I’m so glad you can’t hear this shit. Hell, if I-” Taako sits up and swings his legs over the edge of the bed, facing away from Merle. “-If I turn around I can say literally whatever the fuck I want and you’ll be none the wiser! I’m dating Kravitz, the grim reaper! I wanted to ride Edward before he turned out to be a sociopathic dick! I actually feel bad about hurting Angus’ feelings because he’s like a little brother to me! I haven’t gone outside at all since we got back because _what the fuck am I_ without my beauty? I hate myself! I really, genuinely hate myself! I’m ugly and I can’t even tell how ugly!” Taako throws his arms up with a flourish and slams them down on the edge of the bed, hopping off and stumbling around. 

“Now what the fuck are you doing?” Merle watches Taako grab onto the edge of Magnus’ bed and pulls himself up toward the human’s head, nearly sticking his fingers in the other’s mouth (he can’t see Magnus wince at the feeling of someone touching him) before groping upwards and grasping the Band of Projected Thoughts.

“Tch, are they honestly stupid enough to leave a magical artifact on a normie’s skull? This isn’t even thievery anymore, it’s _charity_.” He pulls the Band of Projected Thought off Magnus’ head and fixes it into his own unkempt hair, turning towards Merle and grinning.

_How do I look?_

“Like a buck naked elf in a headband. ‘Least it’s better than blue lips, they’re not your color. Oh - by the way - Why the fuck did you run off like that?! Everything went to hell in a handbasket in a hurry!”

 _‘Kay, look-_ Takko throws his hands out and rolls his eyes. _I’m gonna tell you exactly what I’ve told the other ten dozen wide-eyed, dumbass interns who asked. I was showering. I relaxed because the water felt nice and I wake up half a second later in the climax of a bad medical drama. I don’t remember walking out, I don’t remember where I went, I don’t remember_ why _I did it!_

“You don’t need to get defensive! I believe you! I just couldn’t hear you when you told the others. You know, because I _wasn’t there_ and _I’m deaf._ ”

 _No need to get so defensive, Merle._ Taako replies mockingly.

“No need to get so defensive, Taako,” Merle copies.

_No need to get so defensive, stinkbeard._

“No need to get so defensive, pencil-dick.”

The two keep on mocking each other in increasing cartoonish tones until a massive tremor rips through the infirmary. They freeze in place, looking around warily as trinkets and furniture rattle around them. The tremors stop as quickly as they came and in the aftermath, Taako can hear thuds and shattering glass in the distance along with dozens of questions and shouts.

 _What was that?_

“I don’t know,” Merle replies as he beelines for the window. Outside, dozens of people are running towards a single point, some taking charge to start a line of people carrying buckets. He opens the window and tries to strain his ears out of habit, only to roll his eye when he realizes it’s futile. “Taako, get over here, I need your ears.”

“Can’t, homeboy, I need your eyes.”

“Say that again? Maybe with the thing I can hear you with?” Merle taps his temple.

 _Uuuuuugh, fine._ Taako yanks the blanket off Magnus’ bed and wraps it around himself before heading to the open window, leaning out as far as he can with his ears twitching wildly as he tries to pick up every word. Merle easily maps the curious, quizzical way the elf tries to pick out words, the split second of confusion and concern as he hears a single critical word, then the wave of dread and horror that smacks into him as he realizes what’s going on. Merle can’t hear the tremor in Taako’s voice but he can see it in the warble of his chin and the way the corners of his lips sink down. “Oh god...” Tears well up in the elf’s eyes as his lips wrap around the words.

“What is it, Taako?! What- what happened?! C’mon, you’re scaring the shit outta me! What- What’s happening?!”

_Our suite’s on fire._

“Our _what_ is _what_ ?! You’re-” Merle breaks out in a nervous laugh. “You’re fuckin’ with me, right? S’not funny, Taako, you gotta get some better material. Who- did someone leave the oven on?! Did you leave a bottle of booze next to a candle or something?! Are you _one hundred percent sure_ it’s _our suite!_?”

_I’m sure! Why would I be lying?! I hear ‘put out their suite’ and I assume it’s our suite! Who else around here has a suite?!_

“There’s-!” Taako was right. There was only one suite on the base and they lived there. Even Lucretia herself lived in a converted dormitory. “There’s... uh... They’ve gotta be- It’s just a word, maybe they’re using it as a synonym for a dorm or something _._

_Yeah, yeah, because those cramped as hell quarters are pretty ‘sweet’._

“You never know! _We’ll_ never know if we stay in here! Let’s-” Merle gasps as a massive hand clamps down on his shoulder. He whips around to see a very groggy and very confused Magnus Burnsides giving him and Taako strange looks. “Mango! You’re-! Oh, fuck me, again?”  
Merle jumps back as Magnus swipes the Band of Projected Thought from Taako, starting yet another squabble between the two taller men. Taako shouts and curls his hands into fists, but before he can lift his arms Magnus knocks him flat on his ass with a single punch and leans out the window. Seconds later Magnus leans back in with a horrified expression and races for the exit

“Magnus?! Magnus what in the world is going on?! Ma- Fuck.” Merle knew he was too slow to catch the other and looks out the window, hoping to see what caused his frantic retreat. He barely sees half of a gurney zip out of the window frame and his heart drops into his groin.

“Oh god...” Merle zips over to Taako and mutters a quick healing spell before running out the exit and smacking into Magnus’ back. Before he can say anything Magnus grabs the other and yanks him out of the way. He grabs the other’s chin and jerks his head into place, pointing at the two gurneys rushing down the path towards the infirmary. Merle opens his mouth to protest, only to fall silent when he spots the two small, burnt bodies on the gurneys. The doctors rush past the two prone men in a whirlwind of shouts and panic, all of them solely focused on yanking their patients off death’s door. They rush into the infirmary without so much as a glance towards Magnus and Merle, leaving them abandoned in the grass as the two slowly look at each other, trying to process the horror of what had transpired in mere minutes.

* * *

 Elsewhere, a lone woman is trying to do the same behind a mask of calm determination while shouting commands to dozens of people: telling them where to throw water on the flames, where openings and weaknesses in the structure lie, and what magical abilities to throw at the raging inferno. She had to be their steadfast, unflappable Director right now. She had to take control of the situation. No matter how much she hated it. No matter how much her back aches she has to stand tall, no matter how badly her hands shake she has to keep a firm grasp on everything. No matter how much her robes fray, her nerves can’t. No matter how out of control everything is she has to maintain the illusion for others.

Lucretia wanted to collapse and wail and scream, wanted to cry out their names and ask the gods why it had to happen to Angus and Davenport.

What had they done to deserve this? Why did she, of all people, deserve to be spared? She let things stew because she could handle the pressure and learned the hard way they couldn't handle the ensuing explosion. Angus was just a boy, his life was just beginning, this couldn’t be his final chapter. Davenport- well, Davenport had only been able to be himself for a day. He needed more time. He deserved more time. If anyone had really deserved this-

That was a thought she couldn’t entertain right now. She needs to _direct_ the hundreds of people who were willing to die for her cause.

“Avi! Get the hose on the elevator! Carey, gather all the silver and white Dragonborn for an assault! Get the brass, gold, and red and anyone else with fire resistance on standby!” She points and throws spells around to guide everyone, pausing as everyone runs off to execute her plans. “Um... ” Lucretia looks around, hoping to see someone by her side or idle enough to ask this one favor. “Can someone please check the infirmary, as well?”

Smoke spews out into the recycled dome air while Killian screams at everyone to get back before several Dragonborn unleash a torrent of ice and water, dousing the outermost flames and allowing them to rush in and hack apart the elevator shaft and the ground above the suite to attack the innermost flames.

* * *

 The Fantasy Costco doors open with their usual jingle, welcoming the pair. Past the cheerful doors, the store is deadly silent, save for the well-built knight stationed at the front door. The two figures give the object a wary glance as they pass but continue on in a hurry. Garfield had recently brought out the thing as an anti-shoplifting measure and taped dozens of “Do Not Touch” signs to the suit of armor after Angus had tried to investigate it. “I- I still can’t- What did I do?! I- that kid and-”

“You didn’t know, and neither did I. But _fuck me_ , I should’ve known! I could’ve done something and I should’ve! If I could go back I would’ve left this base as soon as-”

“I couldn’t leave him behind! Not in that state! He’s-  He’s miserable as hell and he’s barely keeping himself together. This is _nothing_ like cycle 87.”

“Of course this isn’t, that was cycle _87,_ late in the century. We knew what we were doing by then. Remember the first time Magnus got his arm torn off? He rushed in more recklessly than before and didn’t give a damn if he lived or died because he thought - we all thought - that losing a sense or a limb was the end of our lives-”

“Not that they ever ended for real, though.” The other interjects.

“-Right. We got used to not making it to the end in one piece and we learned how to deal with it.”

“Then why hasn’t it been dealt with yet? ‘Cretia’s... Lucretia always had _that interest_ of hers, why hasn’t she done anything yet?! ” 

“I’m sure she’s done something, and I’m sure she’s got more in store planned for them. It’s only been five days, after all, and we don’t have the full story yet. No one does, really.”

“But soon...”

“Soon enough.” The pair reaches the back rooms of Fantasy Costco, where an empty tube lies waiting for a new subject to recreate. One of the figures drops a note in the tube and seals it shut, throwing a tarp over it and rushing out the door. The second figure sticks their hand through the wall and grabs the lock mechanism on the door, willing it to heat up and melt, fusing the door shut permanently before ghosting through to join their partner. 

“Are you ready for part two?”

“More than ready, babe.”

* * *

 “Oh my god...” Merle stands before the blackened pit that was once their suite, staring down at the charred skeleton of the walls that they had called ‘home’ for a year now. People with sticks and boxes walk over the sodden rumble of their home, turning over every piece of wood and digging through every pile of ash in the hopes of finding something to salvage.

Magnus leaps down into the pit before anyone can stop him and runs for the remnants of his room, kicking up ash with every step. He bursts through the burnt remains of his bedroom door and collapses when he realizes everything - every piece of furniture he’d carved, every duck, every half-finished project, every shirt he had owned, the bed he’d slept in mere hours ago, the kitchen full of things he couldn’t eat - all of it was gone. Magnus takes a breath to scream only for nothing to come out, and his tears stream forth even harder from the realization. He wants to scream, he wants to scream so badly he claws at his own throat in the hopes he can tear a single sound out of himself. He wants to wail and curse the gods and beg for answers- but he can’t. The past five days had been utter hell, from the moment in the field when he realized they’d all been cheated, to the invasion of his body by people who told him to lay back and accept their ‘help’, to all the conversations he’d missed. However, kneeling in the remains of his life and forced to bottle up his grief was his absolute lowest point.

Even when he knelt in the ruins of Raven’s Roost he could still scream. The ash dancing in the air, the burn in his throat, the weight in his chest, it was all the same as that day he lost everything he had. He wants to scream, but he’s even lost that.This time he had so much _less_ to lose and it somehow hurts the same. He’d lost everything but the people around him. He lost the chance to scream, but he gained so many people.

As if on cue, Magnus catches the glint of silver out of the corner of his eye and crawls towards it, pushing aside hot ashes and twisted metal. The source turns out to be his lance lying on top of his shield like a spoon over a pot. He pushes it off without a second thought and flips over the shield, his hand instantly flaring up in pain as he burns his hand, but he doesn’t care.

Under the shield, Steven is swimming around his bowl without a care in the world and Magnus' heart soars at the sight. It’s utterly impossible, he knows - Steven had been on his nightstand, and his shield had been under the bed-but he isn't arguing, and the glass knitting needles and the ball of wire cuddling up with Steven tell him exactly who to thank.

* * *

 “I can’t believe this...” Taako lay in his hospital bed, listening to Merle and Magnus toss and turn beside him. Are they sleeping? Or are they just as restless as he is?  
Everything that the crews salvaged from the suite fire fit in a single goddamn box. Magnus got back the head of Railspitter and the blade of his grandfather’s knife (the wooden handles were consumed by the fire) along with everything that had been miraculously set aside by the gods. Merle, being a lover of all things natural, was, unfortunately, a lover of all this flammable. All he got back was his warhammer, a couple of axe heads, and a set of panpipes still wrapped in sheet music. He’d spent hours staring at the pipes when the despot crew member handed them to him, and now he slept with them clutched to his chest.

And what did Taako get? A crooked immovable rod, a core with a prophecy he didn’t understand, a sword he'd never use, a bag from a goddess that still hadn’t served him any purpose, and a pendant. Avi told him he’d found it dangling off a burnt support beam, swaying in an invisible breeze. (Taako refused to set foot in the pit, for several reasons.) He wanted to scream in his face and throw it far away, but there was an irresistible attractiveness to the pendant, even if he couldn’t see it. Avi ‘helpfully’ described the necklace, telling Taako about the unfamiliar face carved into the center and the black metal that made up the frame and the long chain. Taako told Avi to shove it after the third rambling attempt at describing the face and let Magnus escort him to their increasingly familiar hospital room.

He runs his thumbs over the pendant late into the night, trying to decipher who’s on the cameo by touch alone and guessing what metals and gems lay in the intricate lace designs.With each brush of his thumb against the pendant he can feel himself spiraling deeper and deeper into a lull, the complex pattern of swirls, braids, and feathers tugging into further down into a rising tide-

Tide? Wait-

Taako gasps when he realizes he’s drowning in ice cold water and accidentally inhales a lungful of the ozone flavored sea. He thrashes and kicks and flails, wild and frantic, desperately trying to claw his way to the surface. It feels like an eternity later when he finally breaks free, gasping and sputtering, his burning lungs and muscling singing in relief as he swallows mouthfuls of oxygen. The pull from before points him towards something he can’t see, and with nothing else to guide him, Taako swims towards it.

When he finally crawls onto a dark and sandy shore he vomits up a lungful of water, shivering from the chill still that clung to his skin. He turns his head and spits to get the last of the unpleasant taste out of his mouth, a tiny island and a massive, imposing stone building slowly crawling out of the darkness.

“Wait....” He slaps himself in his haste to rub his eyes again, gasping and looking around when he realizes - for the first in days - he can see again! “Oh my god...  Whose- whose sick fucking idea is this? Is this your idea of a _joke?!_ Is- oh god, I can _see_ again... Oh god... Ha! Hahahahaa!” He flops on his back, staring up at the cloudy sky with a dopey grin and thanking god over and over until he hears the crunch of leather shoes on the sand.

“Taako?  You’re not dead, what’re you doing here?! Wait- are you dead? I can never tell with you and your fri- Oh my god, what the fuck is wrong with your eyes?!”


	18. Black Sea, Black Water

Taako freezes for a moment, taking in the sight of Kravitz on this dreary beach and slowly putting the pieces together. (Not that they made any sense when he finally put them together.)

 

“Oh, these things?” Taako reaches up and taps his temple, snapping back to the matter at hand. “I got blinded by a pair of really hot lich twins for a fucking bell. Which I still haven’t gotten paid for, can you believe that?!”

 

Kravitz freezes mid-step, eyes wider than they’d been in millennia and his mouth slackens in the least dignified expression he’d worn in minutes.

 

“...What?”

 

“Yeah, it was really fucked up, I’m still torn up about it, yadda yadda yadda, it got worse. Sooooo my house burnt down today--”

 

“What?!”

 

“I know, right?! It took them so long to pay me that my house burnt down, I started going to a new elf college, got a new job, Candlenights came and went and I found out I had an evil twin before the check came!”

 

“Taako! What the hell happened to you?! It--” Kravitz frantically counts on his fingers, ”It’s been six days, siiiiiiix days--that’s one hundred and forty-four hours--since I last spoke to you. When we last spoke, you were complaining about cheap shampoo and Merle’s table manners. Are you telling me that in _only six days_ , you went blind--"

 

“Uh huh.”

 

“--because of liches somehow not on any of My Lady’s records--”

 

“Uh huh.”

 

“--and your house--which isn’t even a real house on a planet with a carbon cycle or anything, it’s an apartment suite on a glorified tinfoil plate in the sky--caught on fire, likely with all your worldly possessions inside.”

 

“Uh huh.”

 

“Am I missing... _Anything_?” Kravitz inhales deeply, bringing his hands up before throwing them out in a huff.

 

“Uh...” Taako scratches the back of his head and scrunches up his face as he thinks. “Two people might be dying?”

 

“Oh, of--of course, it’s not a good week without a couple of debatable fatalities. Who’s dying? Are Magnus and Merle okay?”

 

“S’alright, it’s just a couple of lowball chums.” He shrugs, crossing his arms and rolling his eyes.

 

“ _Please_ tell me you at least know their names,” Kravitz says in an exasperated huff.

 

“Weeeeelll, the thing is I couldn’t eavesdrop very well since _everything_ was in panic mode today, but I think... it was Angus and Davenport?”

 

Kravitz is dead silent for a long time. The coldness of his expression mirrors the chill of the bloodless beach and Taako finds himself shivering in the grip of it.

 

“Taako,” Kravitz says flatly.

 

“Kravitz,” Taako replies sarcastically.

 

“I love you in all your chaotic antics and your rule-bending ways...” Kravitz bows his head and pinches the bridge of his nose, free hand on his hip,  “...but every time you open your mouth I can feel feel my workload _triple_ .”

 

“What? Does The Lady suddenly have a fire department?”

 

“No. It’s just that the one of the two people you just named is _the total opposite_ of a ‘lowball chum’.”

 

“What?! No way! What kinda racket has Angus been making?!” Taako breaks out in a disbelieving grin"

 

“Well, you see--”

 

“I’m _blind,_ you insensitive fuck.” Taako spits, his grin turning into a snarl.

 

“--You’re not even that offended, darling.” Kravitz rolls his eyes. “Anyway, I’d love to tell you what’s on their records, but the Astral Plane’s been having a hell of a week, too. About five days ago this... _black plague_ descended on the plane, and it flooded the Eternal Stockage and anyone with a working pair of hands has been drafted into the cleanup effort. We’ve had to bail out the lower levels and dry out all the paperwork stored down there. You _do not_ want to know how many records pile up when you’re keeping track of an entire plane’s worth of dead souls and runaway necromancers. I never thought I’d see My Lady with her hair tied up and overalls on so she could wade through muck to hunt down death certificates, but apparently anything is possible these days.”

 

“Speaking of _her_ , I think she gave me a little house warming gift--” Taako gropes at his bare chest and holds out the pendant.

 

Kravitz’s breath catches in his throat when he first sees it. After a few moments, he gingerly reaches for it, tracing his thumb over the cameo. “Taako, are--are you entirely sure about that? My Lady isn’t a very... conversational god. She hasn’t interacted with the mortal plane in centuries.”

 

“It _mysteriously appeared_ in the ruins of my burnt suite with no signs of having been _in_ the fire _itself_. It doesn’t take too many brain cells to solve that mystery.”

 

“That.... _does_ sound fairly plausible. Still, are you--?” Kravitz steps closer, a concerned look on his face.

 

“I am _extremely sure_ , Kravitz. I guess it’s Her attempt at making up for the fact her favorite reaper’s plus one went from a handsome asshole to an ugly, blind, and _homeless_ shit wiz’ in--what’d you keep saying? Siiiiiiiiix days?” Taako draws the word out as long as possible, slowly holding up six fingers for emphasis. Kravitz sighs, a look of concern on his features. “You’re not ugly, Taako. You’re just... wet. And cold, I imagine. Here, I’ll let you borrow my--” Kravitz undoes the intricate clasp on his cloak and whips it off, the fabric fluttering through the air in what seems like a never-ending dance of--

 

Wait, he’s seen this trick before--

 

“Krav--!” Taako tries to cry out and gags as pure shadow rushes down his throat. He’s drowning again, not in an ozone flavored sea, but in pure, cloying shadow. Again, he thrashes and kicks and claws his way to an unknown surface, gasping and sputtering when he finally breaks free and crawls onto solid ground Again he looks around, but what he sees chills him to the core. There’s nothing but pure darkness stretching out for miles on end, broken only by strange textures and distant shapes.

 

Then he sees something--sees _her-_ -slowly peel out of the darkness, her dress trailing miles behind her and merging with the shadows.

 

Taako’s first thought isn’t awe at the fact he gets to meet _the_ bona fide Goddess of Death and live to tell the tale. Nor is it reverence, fear, or any other emotion appropriate for meeting extremely important people who wrap the cosmos around their little fingers. His first thought is how badly he wants to cross his arms, curl up in a ball, go blind all over again, and wake up and tell himself this was all a bad dream. But he knows he can’t. All he can do is try to stand up straight and look her in the eyes.

 

“Uh... hi?” He raises his hand just enough for a half-hearted wave and drops it immediately, hunching his shoulders and pressing his arms as close to himself as possible.

 

“Hello, Taako.” She steps closer out of the darkness, jostling the black feathers and delicate golden chains decorating her dress. The Raven Queen is surprisingly short, but Taako feels _microscopic_ next to her. He opens his mouth to say something, _anything_ , and ends up standing there like an idiot, mouth hanging open and shivering like a frostbitten chihuahua. The silence drags on for what feels like hours and he snaps his mouth shut out of embarrassment, rubbing his frozen forearms and staring at his own feet.

 

“Hello there, Taako...” The Raven Queen repeats, stepping closer and cocking her head as she encircles him. Her dress brushes against his bare legs and he has to bite back a moan from how _soft_ and _warm_ the fabric feels. She reaches out to brush the hair off his shoulder and he tenses up like she’d just pulled out a dagger, holding his breath and eyeing her hand anxiously.

 

“No need to be nervous dear...” With a flick of her wrist, she pulls Kravitz’s cloak out of thin air, shaking it out before draping it over Taako’s shoulders.

 

“Not unless you’ve been cheating death,” she says, leaning close enough for him to count her eyelashes as her perfect lips peel apart in a smirk.

 

“Yeah...” Taako tries to return the smile as he clutches the cloak, cold sweat mixing with the water still clinging to his skin. His teeth start chattering and he clenches his jaw as tightly as he can, desperate to not make a sound.

 

“But you have, haven’t you?” She impassively stares at the cameo hanging off his neck, dragging her ice cold fingers across his bare chest before taking hold of the pendant and holding it closer. Taako’s too terrified to _breathe_ with the Raven Queen so close.

 

“Do you like it?”

 

“Like what?” he hastily spits out.

 

“My gift.” She runs her thumb over the cameo and holds it up for Taako to see, turning her head to match her carved portrait. “I was hoping to use it to accumulate you to my presence, as I’ve been vying for a seer these past few years.”

 

“H-have you, now?”

 

“I don’t get jealous of other gods and their devoted, but it’s always been a desire of mine...”

 

The word ‘ _desire’_ sends a shudder down Taako’s spine and he finds himself digging his nails into his upper arm. ”Um... r-really? Cool. Uh--followers are pretty cool.”

 

“Do you want to be my seer, Taako?” Her tone is nonchalant, but the words send a sword of ice right through him. A seer? Would that mean he could see again? But he’d be a seer for _The Raven Queen_ , so what would he see? Most importantly--

 

“Why are you asking me _now_ ?” The fearful tension melts out of his posture, replaced by resignation. “I mean--fuck, I’m blind, I’m ugly, I’m homeless, I’m not good at _anything_ anymore and it’s not like I was a jack of all trades to begin with! If you wanted someone worth more than half a bucket of shit you should’ve asked me a while ago. Or just ask someone else. I’m sure there’s a handsome fucker with working eyes out there who’d _love_ to get this gig.” His hands fly around to emphasis his every point, but now they hang in the air before slowly sinking back to his sides.

 

“I just... I’m... nothing. I’m not... _anything_ anymore. I’m a blind _idiot_ with nothing left--no skills, no home, no goals, I’ve got _nothing_ going for me. Even if I do Lucretia’s stupid little adjustment lessons, what do I have left? I’d just be sitting around in a house whose layout I have to memorize and waiting to _die_ because I can’t do anything interesting with my life anymore.”

 

The Raven Queen considers Taako’s words with a sympathetic expression, slowly cupping his cheek with a slender, warm hand. He groans and leans into the touch with an embarrassing eagerness, pinning her hand there with his own. “Taako... This is not some prize for a champion to put on a trophy shelf, this is my gift for you if only you’ll take it.”

 

“Why should I? Seriously, I’m nothing. As far as I can tell, the rest of my life is gonna be a pathetic, empty existence where I get to do nothing and have to pretend I’m oh-so-grateful that I’m alive.”

 

“Taako...” She sighs, her delectably warm breath rolling over his bare skin. “My love did not lie when she said you’re going to be amazing. The things you have done and can still do would take your own breath away if only you gave yourself the credit. I want to help you, Taako. I can only act where your life intersects with my domain, but luckily-- ”

 

Color explodes out of the eternal blackness of the Ethereal Plane and the temperature plunges as cold winds buffet Taako. He whips his head around and barely has time to comprehend the mish-mash of silver, blue, and black around him and the swath of red on him before he hears a scream.

 

“Taako! We need battlefield control portside!” a gnomish man clinging to a captain’s wheel shouts, jerking the wheel left and right (no, port and starboard,) to dodge massive black columns ripping through the sky.

 

“What?! What’s going on?!” Taako reaches for his umbrella only to grasp a handful of his red robe.

 

“Taako, look out--!” An unfamiliar female voice screams as a pillar of darkness slams down on him and the world goes black again. Seconds he before he wakes up screaming Taako hears Her whisper in his dream.

 

“--Your life is fraught with death.” 

* * *

 

A man walks into the Tres Horny Boy’s room with a tray of cups and pills while they sleep. He sets it down beside Taako’s bedside and pauses, taking a deep breath before pulling out a flask of ichor and filling three cups equally. “Showtime...”

 

He reaches out to shake Taako’s shoulder only for the elf to gasp awake and scream, flailing wildly to fight off some unseen force.

 

“Taako!” The man grabs Taako’s shoulders as he tuckers himself out, pinning himself to the headboard and panting.

 

“Whu--?! Wha--?! Why can’t I--?! Oh, I... oh yeah... I’m blind...” Taako slumps forward, grabbing the man’s wrists and slowly moving his hands up his arms. “Who the fuck is this?” he grumbles.

 

“I’m--I’m an intern. It’s time for your vitamins.” He slowly lets go of Taako’s shoulders, untangling their arms and grabbing the cup.

 

“Since when the hell do we need vitamins? We’ve been all fucked up for a week now and never got any!” Taako rubs his arms, yanking his blanket around his shoulders and wrapping up with a scowl.

 

“Well, after the fire you’re all under a lot of stress, and that negatively impacts your immune systems. We don’t want you getting sick so--”

 

“Sounds like a bunch of bullshit, hand me the dumb pills.” Taako thrusts out a hand and the intern gives him small, white vitamins, the cup following not long after. He threw back the pills and water in one smooth motion, jerking back as the ichor hits the back of his throat.

 

“Are you alright?”

 

“I’m--M’fine. Just...doesn’t... feel great. Uh--hoo! Kinda... kinda getting’s a little’s.... Um, is this an allergic reaction?” Taako exhales loudly and falls back onto his bed, breathing as slowly and as deeply as he can. “C-can I get a doctor in here?” He reaches out to his side, trying to reach out for the intern and finding nothing. “Hello? He-hey! Hey?! Where are you, you son of a--?!” He feels something wash over his mind and in the blink of an eye he’s paralyzed, trapped in his own skin and forced to listen to B͡͏̴̧a̛͘͠R̵̸R̸̶͢R͏̶̷̡͝-̵̶̡̕͝-̴҉-̵̢-͏̡-̵̕҉-͏̵͘͜-̸ the intern poison his friends.

 

“Sir.” The voice says calmly at Merle’s bedside. There’s rustling sounds as B͜͢_̷-̴͢R҉̸͝R̵͢͡͠y̡%̶̧͘͟^̨̕͠&̶̷͜҉͏  shakes him awake and then silence. Straining his ears, Taako hears the whisper of hands rubbing together and fingers impacting palms. (Sign language? This fool can sign? J͏us̢͠t̛ ̷͜l̛i̧͞k͘e ͜i͘n ̴̴̡Ch̶͘@̢̕*̕$͜^̸&̵̛̕#̷̢͟@͜͡-̕͟͜-̡-̴̡͘-̴҉-҉͜-̸̴̶-͟͠#̧̢̛-̶͝-͝-͞_͜͏!̴ ))))

 

Merle takes the pills and ‘water’ with a heavy swallow, exhaling loudly and and signing something to the inte͝r--B̛a̶͠r͞r͞y͟-̸ rapidly. The intern signs back just as fast and steps away, walking to Mangus’s bedside.

 

“Sir?” There’s more rustling. “Sir? Hello? Sir--Oh! Sheesh, give a guy a little warning next time, I almost spilled.”

 

A pause. Shuffling and rustling. Something metallic is dropped.

 

“Here,” B̨̡̛a͝r̕ry says. Another pause.

 

“It’s some vitamins and an oral rehydration solution. You’ve had it pretty rough, buddy.”

 

There’s another pause and Taako would _kill_ to know what’s going on.

 

“Don’t worry, we added thickener so you shouldn’t have that problem. Just... toss it back like any ol’ drink.”

 

A final pause.

 

“I’m one hundred percent sure, Magnus.” Taako assumes Magnus fell for the dupe and as soon as he does, the Hold Person spell fades away.

 

“Barry?! Barry, what the _fuck_ is going on?!” Taako shoots up in bed, aiming a furious glare at the last place he heard the man’s voice come from. “What the fuck did you just put in us?!”

 

“Taako, calm down, it’s all gonna make sense soon.”

 

“No! I don’t wanna calm down! I want answers!” Taako furiously shoots to his feet and stomps closer to Barry, his pendant held out as a makeshift arcane focus. “Tell me what you did or I unload 6 castings of magic missile on your ass!”

 

“Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit! Don’t--!” There’s a staccato of short, quick footsteps as Barry backpedals away and crashes into an end table. “Don’t do anything you’re gonna regret! Don’t do anything Lup wouldn’t do!”

 

“Lup? Who the hell’s Lu--AH!” Taako clutches his head as imagines flash across his mind’s eye, gaps filling themselves in faster than he can realize there had been gaps.

 

Lup.

 

How could he forget Lup?

 

How could he forget an entire century?

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would like to extend my sincerest "Thank you's to everyone who's waited this long for the next chapter and to everyone who read this far! I'm more excited than I can tell you to be writing again and I'm hoping I can finish this off strong as we barrel towards the finale!


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